


Here I Come to My Own Again

by Zetared



Series: The Prodigal Series [1]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drunkenness, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor wounds, Other, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, canon infanticide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 23:11:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 45,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13421628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zetared/pseuds/Zetared
Summary: In BJ’s letters, Hawkeye Pierce had read like a mythical figure--as fae and capricious as the creatures in her grandmother’s old Scottish folk tales. In life, he is neither a myth nor a man, but something more intangible--a shadow cast to the ground by blazing, burning light.





	Here I Come to My Own Again

**Author's Note:**

> Any mistakes re: canon facts are all mine; fan wikis don’t offer much about Peg as a person, so I made her my own when necessary. Any historical errors are also on my shoulders, though I did try to do as much research as needed to make it feel right...except when it comes to history relating to segregation and other race-related issues of the time, in which case I largely did what I damn well pleased to make the story go. You wouldn’t know M*A*S*H is a comedy from most of these tags. Or the show itself. Or this fic, though I tried my best with the jokes.

As a child, she teaches herself the shape of written language with an ancient, tattered copy of _Wee Willie Winkie._ It’s the first book she can ever rightfully call hers, gifted to her at her christening, one of the few books to ever reside in her childhood home. (Her parents are not ignorant, she would now insist should anyone ask. The fact that she was the first in her family to attend college is a moot point. Some people just don’t understand the importance of books, and that’s all right; they learn about the world in other ways.)

The first fictional character whom Peg ever loved was a child who lived under the shadow of military rule. Perhaps, in hindsight, there is some irony in that fact.

She has a strange, selective memory when it comes to words she has read again and again. Phrases often rise up in her consciousness with little warning or context, familiar but adrift. Despite this, she can recite from memory the first line of “Wee Willie Winkie” with no trouble at all: “His full name was Percival William Williams, but he picked up the other name in a nursery-book, and that was the end of the christened titles.”

She will remember this line with utter clarity the first time she reads about Benjamin Franklin ‘Hawkeye’ Pierce in BJ’s letters, and she will smile the smile of someone reunited with an old friend.

\--

As a young adult, she finds she has no real love for Kipling, with his overburdened vocabulary and heavy handed use of dialects. She picks up _The Jungle Book_ and “The White Man’s Burden” and places them side by side, constructing her final thesis on themes of colonialism and the hubris of white men and women to think themselves somehow more inherently advanced than any of their fellow human beings. Writing the weighty paper leaves her emotionally and mentally drained. Defending her thesis to her professor in those final hours of her last semester is comparatively very easy. It helps her case, perhaps, that she chooses to close her paper with an old Quaker adage: You lift me, and I’ll lift thee, and we’ll ascend together.

She graduates from Bryn Mawr College with honors. Not even a month later, she meets the man that she will one day marry, and while the diploma hangs even now on their bedroom wall, not much else comes of that brief, whirlwind affair with higher education. At least, not for several years.

None of this matters, at the time. She thinks nothing of Kipling at all, in fact, until one remarkable moment on a beautiful spring day in Chicago. She stares into the bloodshot eyes of a stranger she knows as well as her own soul and a quote, drifting and unbidden as they always are, rises to the top of her thoughts--the opening lines from Kipling’s poem “The Prodigal Son.”

\--

The little medal falls to the floor with a dull, muffled thud, and Peg’s fingers freeze on the black dress socks in her hands. Against the cream fibers of the rug, the bronze star stands out, impossible to miss. The ribbon--coarse to the touch and red, if she remembers rightly--is nowhere in sight. Instinctively, Peg glances at the socks in her hands once more. She turns out the toes, just in case. No ribbon. It must have ended up buried elsewhere in the drawer.

It never occurred to her to ask her husband where the medal had gone. He’d brought it home with him, she remembered that. She’d found it in the closed pages of a book in his luggage after he’d come back. He had told her about how he’d earned it, once, in one of his letters. But that had been many months before his return, and she’d forgotten about its existence. So, apparently, had he. She’d flattened the wrinkled ribbon with her fingers, then, and placed it on the bedroom dresser, intending in a vague way to have it framed, perhaps--a gift for a future birthday.

She hadn’t noticed its second disappearance, either. So much had happened, in those first few weeks after BJ’s return. Of course the medal had slipped her mind. It had not, she assumes, found its way into BJ’s old socks by itself. 

She bends low and picks up the medal, squeezing the blunted legs of the star between her fingers, frowning at it. It doesn’t seem right to hide it away again. But she doesn’t want to bring it to BJ’s attention--not if he doesn’t want to see it. _Too precious to throw away, too painful to display,_ she thinks, sadly. This describes much of what BJ brought back with him after the war, in fact, both literally and in a metaphorical sense. 

“Hey, Peg, do you think we should bring the--.” BJ’s voice cuts off. Peg turns toward him and fights the sudden, childish urge to hide the glint of metal behind her back. Instead, she holds it up.

“It fell out of your sock.”

BJ’s face goes blank with a lack of expression that she recognizes and has only recently begun to understand. She thinks of it as his War Mask, something additional that trailed behind him when he came back--like the mustache and his newfound habit of drinking cheap alcohol after dinner.

_The pity of war,_ Peg recalls, her inner voice rather too dry and cynical for her own tastes. She forces a smile. _When you smile, you feel happier._ She remembers that as a fact, though she can’t remember where she read it. “We probably don’t need to take this with us to Chicago,” she quips, and lets the star fall back into BJ’s sock drawer. Later, after they get back from their trip, she’ll dig the medal and the ribbon up again. There is a shoebox, small and unremarkable, hidden under her side of their bed. In it are all of BJ’s letters, wrapped up in ribbons worn at the knots from being so often untied. She’ll put the medal there and keep it for another day far away, for a time when the war doesn’t cling to every minute and molecule in the house. 

BJ’s face clears as the star falls from his sight. She hopes he made a wish. “An umbrella. Do we need one?”

“Oh, I don’t think so. If we do, we can buy one there, right?” 

BJ nods, approving, and Peg feels a rush of warmth. She’s missed this. Easy, unnecessary words between them, spoken with hardly any thought and just as quickly forgotten, lost to time. It’s so different than their letters, where every word was an agony to craft, and every syllable soaked into the paper remained as eternal as the ink.

It’s been almost two years since their letter days, and Peg can still hardly believe that this new reality--their old reality--is more than just a hopeful dream. She is happy to take on all of the excess, the buried stars and lost ghosts and BJ’s nightmares and all of it. It’s a small price to pay to have him back, to have their lives more-or-less restored and moving forward, again. 

“Do you want to call your parents?” BJ offers as he pushes the largest suitcase into the trunk. Peg doesn’t think it’s going to fit, but she doesn’t say anything. Let him try. Meanwhile, she fishes the roof straps from the glovebox and starts to loop them--surreptitiously--through the doors. “Again? We just called this morning.”

“Yeah, but we’re leaving now. We should tell Erin goodbye.”

Peg’s heart aches. It’s an old ache, now. Hardly worth paying attention to. But the bruise is still there, for all of them. “We’re only going to be gone a week. We can call once we land. I’m sure the hotel has a phone.”

It’s the first time BJ’s been away from Erin since he got back from Korea. Peg understands that it’s hard for him. It’s not easy for her, either. But Erin’s not a baby any longer, and she’ll be safe and happy in the care of her grandparents. They’ll only be gone for a few days. Peg touches BJ’s hand. He takes her fingers in his own, offers her a sheepish smile. 

“Guess I have some separation anxiety.” He sighs, giving up on the big suitcase. He pulls it out of the trunk and goes to toss it on the roof, eyes scanning toward the glove box only to realize that half of his job has already been done. He throws her a smile in gratitude. 

“She’ll be fine,” Peg insists. “Better than the two of us, probably. My parents will spoil her rotten, and you know Waggle will keep her entertained.” Erin loves the aging Jack Russell with all her heart; that dog and their daughter are the best of friends. 

BJ frowns. “Are you sure you want to come with me? You really don’t--.”

Peg rolls her eyes and, gently, tweaks one side of his mustache. “I want a vacation.”

“It’s going to be so lonely for you, with me at the conference during the day.”

“So leave me some money. I’ll go shopping. I won’t even realize you’re gone.” She grins at him, teasing.

BJ grins back. “Sorry. I know you can take care of yourself. I just don’t want you to be bored.”

“I won’t. I’m packing a book.”

BJ’s eyes narrow in suspicion at her as he leans around the strapped down luggage. He pulls hard on the ropes, securing it with a preciseness that she is sure he did not possess prior to his military life. “Peggy, you aren’t going to spend the whole trip holed up in a library, are you?”

“No,” Peg hazards, slowly. “I intend to visit several of the branches, actually. So I’ll be ‘holed up’ in _multiple_ libraries.”

“ _Peg_ ,” BJ says, laughing. His eyes are dancing, his expression fond. Ignoring the fact that they are standing in the driveway where all the neighbors can see, Peg goes to him and rises up on her tiptoes. She gives BJ a kiss. 

They finish packing. In the end, they do call her parents one last time. Erin is down for a nap and therefore not available for the phone call, but the attempt seems to put BJ at ease, regardless. 

“We’ll call again when we get settled,” Peg promises. They’ll be two hours ahead in Chicago. She makes a mental note to reset her wristwatch on the plane. 

\--

Peg has flown before. She’d flown from home to college and back several times, in fact--but it’s been a few years. While Peg’s parents had been more than capable of funding her holiday visits, money is tighter now and air travel stretches far beyond the means of a young doctor and his wife. Peg feels some gratitude toward BJ’s hospital for buying his ticket. Perks of the job, BJ says. He’s presenting at the medical conference. Something that will make his supervisors look very good, indeed. Peg’s plane ticket comes out of their shared account. In truth, even that is a bit of a luxury they can scarcely afford. Still, they’ve discussed it and planned for it for months, and both agree that they need a bit of time together, just the two of them.

“A second honeymoon,” BJ had teased at the time. Peg had just smiled, knowing that his levity was only a partially feigned. He’s been talking a lot, lately, about the possibility of having another child. When she packs, Peg slips new lingerie into her small suitcase, just in case. She also does the math in her head and breathes a sigh of relief she chooses not to dwell on too long. 

The trip from San Francisco to Chicago is not an easy one. They have to stop and switch planes several times, and by the time the two of them shuffle tiredly out of the last machine and into the Chicago city airport, both BJ and Peg long for a warm shower and a nap. 

Peg calls home immediately, as she’d promised. She hands the receiver over to her husband while she finally remembers to fiddle with her watch, putting time to rights from its two-hour skew. 

“Hi, Bunny!” BJ greets with great cheer. Erin’s high, piping voice is clear even from where Peg is sitting, though she can’t make out her daughter’s words. BJ and Erin chat back and forth for several minutes. Peg spends the time taking down her hair and brushing out the old curls. She steps out of her heels and tugs off her nylons. She thinks maybe they’ll order room service this first night. 

BJ hands her the phone. 

“Hi, sweetie.”

“Mommy!” Erin trills, just as brightly as she’d greeted her father. “We made cookies! Mine are the best ones!”

“I’m sure that’s very true. How many cookies have you eaten?”

Erin pauses. She’s going to tell a fib. Peg knows that silence well. “One.” In the background, Peg can hear her mother’s knowing laughter. Peg guesses that her child has eaten three cookies, at the least. Oh, well. What is the point of grandparents if not to spoil their charges when able? Peg would like to eat many cookies herself, right now. Her stomach growls. BJ snickers at the sound. Peg throws a pillow at him.

“Was it delicious?”

“Yes!”

Their conversation goes on in a similar vein for a while. BJ gets restless a few minutes into it. He trails his fingertips over Peg’s bare shoulders and she shivers. Eventually, her hunger--a useful word, covering many kinds of appetite--gets the best of her and she bids her daughter a loving goodbye. 

“We’ll call again tomorrow,” she promises. Erin, distracted by some new delight (perhaps more sweets), just hangs up. 

Peg laughs, reaching over her husband to settle the receiver in its cradle. “That child takes after you most, you know.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. I know you pilfered the last piece of cherry pie last week. You still had crumbs of it in your mustache when I asked.”

BJ smiles. “Oh, well. Do I have any crumbs now?” He brings his lips in close for inspection. She snorts, brushing her finger over the bristles. 

“No.”

“Good.” And he kisses her, deeply, and Peg resigns herself--not with much resentment--to putting off their dinner for a few hours more.

\--

In the morning, Peg places the room service tray by the door and dances around it into the hall. She checks the door handle to make sure she’s locked it properly--one never knows with unfamiliar keys; she checks it twice, just to be sure--and makes her way to the lobby. BJ left very early in the morning. Registration for his conference started right at eight, and he had plans to meet with some old colleagues for breakfast, first. (Truly old colleagues, doctors he had known during his days of residency, long before Korea was more than a distant place on the map to them both.) 

Peg checks her lipstick in a handy mirror just outside the elevator. She has a sparkle in her eye and a bounce in her step. So far, their trip to the city has done wonders for her spirits--and BJ’s, too. If she’d known that all it would take was some, hm...alone time...she would have arranged for a vacation for the two of them much earlier. 

Peg walks with confidence into the bustling streets, armed with a city map and smile. She does absolutely intend to spend her first day in Chicago at the library--BJ knows her too well--but she feels that a cup of coffee and some breakfast would serve her best, first.

Finding the small diner isn’t too difficult, though she does have to ask for directions from several different groups before she finds a real local among them. Chicago is becoming the hub of many tourism opportunities, it seems, though most of the people Peg speaks to say they are visiting relatives and the like. Peg knows that BJ wouldn’t approve of how she travels, striking up conversations with strangers with such careless ease. What BJ doesn’t know won’t hurt him, however. 

Outside of the diner, she strikes up an animated conversation with a another woman waiting patiently in line for service. They go in together and decide to share a meal.

“My husband is here for a conference,” Peg says by way of explanation as the waitress pours their coffees. “He’s a doctor.”

“Oh, hey!” explains her companion, eagerly. “That’s a pretty good catch!” Her name is Madeline. She’s only a few years older than Peg and, as it turns out, both are alumni of the same university--Bryn Mawr College, a small Quaker institution for women. Peg feels that Madeline’s face--wide and warm, sparkling brown eyes over a wicked grin--is familiar. Madeline must have made a splash while she attended, even if Peg never met her personally. Peg wonders, fleetingly, where Madeline had lived as a student, since she obviously hadn’t lived in the campus dorms. The last Peg had heard about her alma mater, they’d only just allowed a Negro woman to live on campus for the first time in 1954. 

Peg laughs. “I guess so. Are you married?” She asks the question with careful tact, these days. After a war, it’s important to not assume that every young woman has attachments. 

Madeline shakes her head, but she smiles while she does it. Not widowed, then. “Nah, not me. I don’t think I ever will, actually.”

Peg’s eyes widen slightly. “ _Never_?” 

Madeline shrugs. “Why should I? I go on dates sometimes for the fun of it, sure. But mostly, I got a good job these days. I can support myself.” As it turns out, Madeline had gone out into the world right after graduation and picked up some of the slack stateside in the latter years of the previous war. She’d settled down permanently into factory work not long afterward and has, in the intervening years, risen up the ranks of the operation. She’s supervisor over all of the female personnel and keeps all the accounting books herself. Peg feels a bit in awe of her, honestly, though she doesn’t say so. Madeline probably isn’t the only career woman in the post-war world, after all, just one of a very few whom Peg herself has ever met. 

Madeline insists on paying for their meal, which Peg allows because, she reasons, she only has so much spending money in her purse for the day. And, besides, Madeline is the _de facto_ host, being a Chicago native and all. 

“Sure you don’t need a tour guide?” Madeline asks, as the two women hug goodbye. They’ve traded mailing addresses and phone numbers, and Peg absolutely intends to keep in contact once she’s returned home. 

“No, thanks. I really just plan on perusing at the library.”

Madeline laughs, her head thrown back in delight. “Honestly? The library? Good gravy, kid, don’t you know you’re in _Chicago_? There’s so much to see! So much to do! So much to eat!”

Peg smiles. “Oh, that’s for later. You always have to go to the library, first, when you visit somewhere new.”

“Oh? Why?” 

“That’s the best way to know what a place is really like, is why. That’s where the soul of a place is kept. In the libraries.”

Madeline hugs her again. Peg surrenders to the embrace with good humor. She really doesn’t mind. It’s been a long time since she had a friend. For a while, her whole reality had been focused on BJ and the life they were creating together. Then he’d left for Kora and the focus of her life became, by necessity, the challenge of raising Erin alone. There had been no time for anything else in between, and no real reason to look for anything else after. Now, BJ is back home, and her parents live nearby and she _could_ push it all aside and force the borders of her self-made cage further apart. But she doesn’t. She hasn’t. Not yet. Now, having spent the morning with Madeline, she remembers what she’s been missing, and she makes a promise to herself to try harder to meet new people and make friends all her own.

The two women part ways and Peg continues on by herself. Finding the library on the map is much easier than finding the diner. It’s a big, impressive building with massive stone arches and, inside, beautiful domes of delicate glass. Peg wanders the interior for a long time, momentarily more entranced with the architecture of the space itself than the soul she believes it contains. 

Eventually, the books start to draw her attention more than the ceiling and walls. She gravitates with a warm sense of familiarity toward the old classics--Shakespeare, Dickinson and the like--but doesn’t pluck them from their shelves. She instead pulls a small pile of previously unknown treasures--Nella Larson’s _Passing_ , Sinclair Lewis’s _It Can’t Happen Here,_ and other titles both strange and compelling--from the shelves and takes up a whole table in the reading room all by herself. She used to study like this in her college days, alone at a desk with a moat of books surrounding her, keeping her secure and safe, away from the world. The feeling of security it inspires is the same as those long hours in the campus library, even though nothing else is. 

She’s deeply engrossed in the first few pages of a rather racy new novel called _Spy in the House of Love_ when a unexpected noise breaks the comforting quiet of the room, causing Peg and several other readers to startle in their seats. A man has stumbled into the desk of another patron, knocking his stack of books and a few collected newspapers to the ground. The sound echoes even full seconds later, the noise battering about the stone and marble interior with glee. The man at the reading table seems angry. He gets to his feet and stomps around the desk, reaching down to grab the offending patron, who by now has dropped to his knees to collect the books he dislodged. 

“Hey!” the advancing man hisses. Peg feels herself go rigid. She’s not been witness to many fights in her life, but the sudden tension in the air seems prophetic, promising ensuing violence. Her eyes dart reflexively toward the door, from which someone in authority will surely soon step and put things to rights. _It’s not fair. He didn’t mean to do it. It’s just a few toppled books._

“I knew it was you,” the angry man says. He’s whispering, but his voice carries almost as much as the clatter of the fallen books. “It’s always you. Why haven’t those damn librarians kicked you outta here, yet, huh?” He has the other man’s lapels in his fists, now, and has pulled him up. He gives him a hard shake. Too hard. The other man hangs limp as a ragdoll, and his head snaps back with the force. Peg winces in sympathetic pain.

Peg looks around. Some of the other patrons are watching, motionless, like her. Some are staring intently at their pages, ignoring the incident entirely. A stab of mingled anger and pity spears through her, causing her cheeks to go immediately red. She’s never been comfortable with confrontation, but what she’s witnessing now makes her blood boil, even more so because no one seems willing to help. 

Suddenly, a remembered quote filters up through her feelings of frustration and fear, causing her to jump to her feet. _The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake._ “Excuse me!” she says. She does not whisper. She can’t whisper around the sudden constriction in chest. She forces the overwhelming emotions of panic down and tries to remember the cool, collected tone she uses when Erin’s behavior is poor and must be called out. She clears her throat, and, indeed, her next words are clearer, cool as ice. “Excuse me, sir, but you’re being very rude.”

The clumsy man giggles. It’s a terrible, high-pitched sound, too desperate to indicate any real amusement. “Definitely discourteous. Emily Post will have words, you know.”

Peg ignores this statement. She approaches the broader, angry man with her hands lifted and open in supplication. “It was just a silly accident. I’m sure this gentleman would be happy to put the rest of your books to rights and go on his way, if you’d let him go. I’ll help tidy it up.”

Peg does not approve of the dark, irritated look the angry man throws at her. 

“Listen, _honey_ , no offense--,” he begins, with a tone that indicates that offense is most certainly coming her way.

“Too late,” the other man says, brightly, his own red-rimmed eyes flashing down to Peg’s sides. She follows his gaze and realizes that her hands have gone from open in a gesture of peace to fisted tightly at her sides, ready for war. 

“Put him down, please,” Peg says. (Her voice contains echoes of a hundred other demands made in exactly the same firm tone: Erin, put that away. Erin, stop that at once. Erin, that isn’t for eating. Erin, you mustn’t do that again.) 

The aggressor snorts at her. Still, perhaps he realizes he’s making a scene. His fisted hands slowly lower. The drunken man goes with them, sinking down, down...down. He fails to find his footing when he should and soon is sprawled on his behind on the floor, looking around himself with the dazed expression of the sleep-deprived and well-soused. Peg is starting to understand the frustration the library regulars apparently feel toward the man. Even so, she goes to him. As promised, she scoops up the remaining fallen books and loose pages and returns them, neatly, to the table from which they were tossed. 

She then applies herself to the task of getting the drunk man--there is no doubting it so close up; he reeks of alcohol--up onto his feet. He’s taller than her by a head and a half, but he weighs hardly anything. It’s still an awkward slog, the man being all limbs and boneless at once. She manages to push him into the nearest chair. No one around them moves to help her. She stands back, panting softly and patting worriedly at her hair. She hopes she doesn’t look too much of a mess. BJ will ask questions if she comes back to their hotel ruffled. She turns to the aggressive man. 

“I trust everything is all right, now?” she asks, still playing cool and trying her best to project control of the situation. 

The man grunts at her in response. He picks up his small stack of items and shoots the other man a dark look before glancing back her way. “Just keep him away from me. Useless street trash. Can’t believe they let his type in here at all.”

Peg clenches her jaw and watches him walk away, relieved when he disappears out of the room, probably going to try his luck for peace and quiet elsewhere. When she looks around the rest of the room, everyone has returned to their books with the same over-dedicated fervor as before. All of her mocked up bravery disappears, leaving her shaken and uncomfortable. She sits down heavily in the nearest chair, breath going out of her in a rush. 

The drunk squints over at her, frowning to himself. “Hey. Your picture ever been in a magazine?”

Peg isn’t sure what he’s really asking, but there’s something unsavory lurking under the words. She crosses her arms over her chest and glares at him, refusing to be cowed. “No. Why?”

“You look familiar.”

“You don’t,” she retorts, immediately.

He laughs. It’s a quieter giggle now--thank goodness--but still a strange sound. Too wild, too frantic. She watches him for a few seconds. It’s rude to stare, she knows, but considering the circumstances she can’t bring herself to care much about propriety. She does, however, care about the sanctity of the space they currently occupy. 

“Can you walk?”

The man blinks at her slowly, as if she’s just asked him the most ridiculous question he’s ever heard. He looks down at his legs and gives each one an experimental flex. “Oh. Maybe.”

“Good,” she says, whispering now. “Let’s go somewhere else.”

The look the man gives her is _definitely_ unsavory. She rolls her eyes at him. “Not like that. I want to talk to you. But we’re bothering people, here.”

A new light dawns in his eyes and, for the first time, he looks around himself and seems to actually register his surroundings. “The library,” he tells himself, voice much softer, now. “Right. Ok. Lead on.”

She has to grab his elbow and hold him upright for a moment, but eventually he gets his land legs again and is able to follow her steps as she walks quickly out of the reading room, across the main lobby, and out onto the street. She sits down on the far edge of one of the curved steps and pats the stone next to her invitingly. He sprawls down as ordered. He winces as he does so, and she wonders if the angry man really hurt him, before.

“Did that man hurt you?” she asks, outright. 

He’s still squinting at her with an odd, speculative eye. “No.”

“You’re in pain, though.”

His eyebrows jump briefly, like startled cats. Surprised she noticed, or surprised that she seems to care? “Old war wound,” he says. His tone indicates it’s supposed to be a joke, but she takes it at face value. 

“Oh.” Her eyes dart over him from head to toe, taking in a face prematurely lined and hair prematurely gray--a young man aged by circumstance and not the passage of time. “Korea?”

She sees it in his expression, the same as it looks on BJ’s face. The War Mask, blank and impenetrable, turning faces both familiar and strange into nothing but lifeless renderings carved from stone. His sort of...flickers, though, something sharp and raw lingering in his eyes. She nods. “I see.”

He presses his palms against the stone step. His flailing is so ineffectual, it takes her a moment to realize that he’s trying to get up, that he intends to leave. She reaches out--propriety? What propriety?--and snags the hem of his coat with her fingers, pulling down. She can hear a seam somewhere ripping loose. His clothes are ancient, stiff with dust and sweat. The dark brown suit was probably quite nice, once, but no more. She wonders, fleetingly, how long he’s been on the streets dressed in such a way. It’s nearing summer, now, and the city is warm, but the winters must be hellish with such thin armor against the Chicago wind. 

_Focus, Peg_ , she tells herself. This is not the first homeless, wandering man she’s seen on the city streets. Chicago has had the problem since its founding, practically. The war--the wars, more accurately--have not helped. She wonders how many of the other threadbare, hungry-looking street dwellers out there have the War Mask, too, hidden in their pockets, ready at any moment to hide their pain away behind it. 

“Please stay,” she says, tugging again. He isn’t pulling against her very hard. Peg isn’t sure if that’s because he’s afraid of hurting her or if he simply doesn’t have the strength. In the end, she wins. He flops back down. He winces again, this time a hand going to press flat against his side. His ribs, maybe. She doesn’t know. She has a vague knowledge of human anatomy, but nothing like BJ’s. She’s no doctor. At school, she studied literature. Words are good for mending broken hearts and resurrecting souls, but do little for torn flesh and shattered bone. 

“What do you want from me?” the man asks her. He doesn’t sound accusatory or angry. He doesn’t even look curious, anymore. Just tired. 

“I’m not sure,” she admits. “But I do think you owe me a bit of your time. I’m pretty sure I saved you from a pummeling in there.” She tosses her thumb back toward the library’s front door. She hopes that no one comes to chase them off the steps anytime soon. So far, all passerby seem oblivious, only a few eyes raking over them before drifting away again. Peg appreciates the anonymity of the city, sometimes. As long as they don’t move too much or talk too loud they won’t draw attention.

“All right. Sure. Have some of my time. I’ve got loads of it. Heaps, even. I’ve got so much time to spare, I always run five minutes fast.”

She considers him a moment, pulling her purse into her lap and digging through it. The man watches her. He’s tense and wary, now. She wonders if he thinks she’s got a gun tucked in under her lipstick, or something even worse. She excavates a carefully wrapped handkerchief from within and holds it out to him. “I went to a very nice diner for breakfast. I was going to save these for my husband, but he won’t know what he missed out on, I guess.”

The man’s eyes fix on the small white bundle. There’s a hunger there she recognizes but cannot empathize with. She’s never been hungry in her whole life. Not really. This man has. And he is, right now. 

“I don’t need your charity,” he says, slowly. It’s a token protest. She knows men well enough to recognize that right off. BJ is the same. Always denying that he is cold, that he is uncomfortable, that he needs her help. She always laughs and helps him, anyway. She doesn’t laugh at the stranger. She does, however, reach her hand out a little further between them. 

He reaches back. His fingers brush hers, sunburned and bony where her own are pale and hale. His nails are ragged, chewed to the quick. One thumb stands out like, well, a sore thumb, covered up as it is in grimy gauze. The bandage is old and ugly. The wrapping itself--a careful weaving of criss-crossed pieces--strikes her as strange for reasons she cannot yet identify. She files it away for later; why she should need any of this information later, though, she doesn’t know. 

He takes the square of folded white linen like it’s something infinitely more precious and opens it with great care, pulling back the petals of a stubborn flower. The stack of butter cookies inside are already a bit mangled, crumbling on the edges, their thick buttercream frosting smeared. The man doesn’t seem to mind much as he picks up the topmost cookie and crams it into his mouth all in one massive bite. Peg looks away. His atrocious table manners remind her of Waggle, the Jack Russell Terrier they keep at home.

She feels a nudge against her shoulder and looks back. Cheeks full, the man offers her a closed-lipped smile. He holds the kerchief between them, listless and dripping crumbs. She shakes her head, putting up a hand and pushing his own back toward him. “Keep it.”

His eyebrows draw in for a moment, but then he shrugs. He swallows thickly, crumpling the fabric in his hand and then opening his fist again. The linen has gone immediately gray and grungy, picking up the dust from his palms. “I guess I wouldn’t want it back, either, in your shoes.”

“I have plenty of others. It’s a gift, that’s all.”

“Seems to me like you’re doing a lot of giving and not much in the way of taking. What do you want? Really, I mean it. Don’t keep me in suspense. I’m already nervous. Those cookies could have been poisoned, for all I know.” 

She isn’t sure if he’s being serious or not. He has that kind of tone, that kind of face, the sort of flashing teeth and tossing head that keeps a person guessing. She pulls her knees up--not very ladylike in her current skirt, but what the hell--and rests her chin on them, staring at him thoughtfully. He squirms under the examination, but he doesn’t try to run away again. 

“My husband was in the war,” she says, after a long silence. 

Understanding lights up in his eyes. It’s not a good kind of knowledge. She thinks his War Mask might return again soon, if she presses the issue much. “I’m sorry,” he says. 

“Don’t be. He came back. He’s fine. Mostly fine.”

“Oh. Well, then, congratulations. So, that’s what this has to do with me, huh? _Schadenfreude_. I’m not judging. It makes a lot of sense. Hell, sometimes I think I should take this show on the road. I could visit all the wives and families of the dead and the walking wounded. I just need a sign. A slogan in big block letters: ‘Post War Life Got You Down? Don’t Be Sad; It Could Always Be Worse!’” He presses fingers against his sternum, indicating just what ‘worse’ is. 

Peg’s hands clench in her lap again, tense with sudden rage. She never used to get so angry so abruptly, before. That was before, though. Life now is different. She wants to pretend it isn’t, but it is. Men and women carry Masks, and the people who love them can do nothing but try, fruitlessly, to break through the rock. She _is_ lucky. She’s lucky BJ came back alive. She’s lucky he came back physically whole. She’s lucky that the nightmares are so quiet, most days, that he only drinks too much when she’s asleep and he thinks she doesn’t know. God, she’s a monster for even thinking such things, for putting her happiness over that of her own husband, over the hundreds of thousands of people like him who came back broken or not at all. Her eyes snap to the stranger, sharp and full of fire. He’s a monster, too, for making her realize her own oily thoughts, her own twisted motivations in helping a stranger.

“Shut up,” she says, fiercely. “Just...stop talking.”

Genuine puzzlement washes over his face, throwing his previous sardonic expression into disarray. “I thought you wanted to have a conversation.”

“I did!” Peg cries, frustration clear, “But then you opened your mouth!”

To her shock, the man throws back his head in laughter. It’s the first laughter she’s heard from him that strikes her as actually genuine, if only in part. His cackle melts into a soft, persistent giggle. His eyes get teary with it. The drops leave tracks of mud over his grimy cheeks. He uses the crumpled, gifted kerchief to wipe the moisture away, soiling the linen even more. “Sorry! Sorry. It’s just...we’ve only just met and you already sound like some of my closest friends. I guess I’m not making a great impression.”

She sniffs, some of the rage draining out of her as quickly as it came. “You’re sloppy and clumsy. You’re covered in dirt and who knows what else. Also you’re lacking in basic tact.” She pauses. “I’ve dealt with worse, actually. I have a six-year-old daughter.”

He smiles ruefully. “Listen, you’re a really nice person, but I don’t want to make things hard for you. I’m sorry if I made you mad. I don’t talk to people much anymore, and even back when I got more practice, I was pretty bad at it. My foot and my mouth are very close; I expect I’ll get a wedding invitation any day now.”

“No. You hit a nerve, that’s all. You’re right. What you said. I guess I saw you and I just...I _am_ glad. I’m glad that my husband came home. I’m glad he has work and a family and a home and three square meals a day. I’m sorry you don’t, but I’m...glad that he’s not where you are. That no one has to feel sorry for him.”

She thinks saying such a terrible thing might make the man upset, that he’ll get up and try to leave again (and this time she will let him). To her surprise, though, he just shrugs. 

“I kid around a lot. All the jokes used to help keep things at a distance. A convenient way to lie to myself about everything happening around me. If I could joke about it, it couldn’t be that terrible. Now, I figure the self-delusion isn’t worth it. I’ve gotten wise to my own con. I know what’s what, and I know what people think when they see me. Don’t feel bad. If it helps, you’re not the first.”

Her eyes widen in horror, guilt settling heavily in her stomach. “Oh, no. _Really_? How awful for you.”

He shakes his head. His hair is in dire need of a good cutting. It scrapes against the collar of his jacket, flops in a tangle over his eyes. “It’s not so bad. Last time...I was hanging around the library that day, too, come to think of it. It’s a good place to go to keep out of the rain, and no one will bother you as long as you stay quiet and look busy. Anyway, I was just pulling down a book from a shelf when one of the librarians came up to me. I’d been in a few times before. No incidents on my part--nothing like today--but it was pretty obvious that some of the other patrons weren’t happy about my being there. So, I figured she was gonna give me the riot act. Kick me out, finally. But instead, she does like you. Gives me half her lunch. Sits down with me in the staff lounge. Tells me about her son. He came back, the poor bastard. They sent him home on a Section 8. He sits all day in his mother’s parlor, staring out the window, watching the birds. Never says a word. Can’t fend for himself. Won’t eat, won’t drink, won’t...well, you get the idea. She said he’s like a body without a soul in it. And she hated that. Hated that Korea had chewed up her son and only spit part of him back out. But, by God, at least he came back. And at least _he_ had somewhere warm to sleep at night and somebody to love him.” 

The man’s smile is not amused. It’s a baring of teeth, a physical display of internal pain. “I don’t know the kid. I don’t know if he’s happy where he is or-or _how_ he is. But that woman was more at peace for having met me, for seeing where her son might be without her. And, honestly? I really am glad. Someone ought to get some peace.”

In hindsight, she’ll look back on this as the moment she made up her mind about him. In truth, though, she’d made it up far earlier, perhaps from the moment he’d stumbled and knocked that other man’s books all over the floor. BJ doesn’t like how friendly Peg is, sometimes, how she always jumps at the chance to make a stranger into a friend. What BJ doesn’t know won’t hurt him, though, so she holds out her hand out yet again. This time it’s empty, open and flat palmed, preparing for a shake. “I’m Peg Hunnicutt. Peggy to my friends.”

She watches, bemused, as the man’s eyes go wide and round. _Don’t fire ‘til you see the whites of their eyes_ , Peg thinks, the old quote floating up into her mind from unknown places, inspired by the way his eyes flash panic and confusion in the daylight. “What’s wrong?” she asks, her hand dropping slightly. 

He fumbles, both of his hands snatching at her offered one, squeezing her fingers tight and trembling around them more than offering a proper shake. “I’m--Jesus, it’s not possible is it?--Peg, Peg _Hunnicutt?_ I’m--.” He swallows. If his hands shake any harder, they might phase cleanly through her own. His eyes search her face as they had been before, now with a much more sober intensity and true recognition. “My name is Hawkeye Pierce. I think I know your husband.”

\--

In BJ’s letters, Hawkeye Pierce had read like a mythical figure--as fae and capricious as the creatures in her grandmother’s old Scottish folk tales. In life, he is neither a myth nor a man, but something intangible--a shadow cast to the ground by blazing, burning light.

_Icarus_ , she thinks, correcting herself. Wingless and ashen, drowning unnoticed in the sea. A myth, after all. Just a sad one. 

He starts to breathe oddly after the introduction. She’s never seen a panic attack before. She’s not even sure she’s seeing one now. Instinct (of the maternal variety, perhaps) rises up in her, however, and she finds herself kneeling on the step below him, holding each of his hands in one of her own. She speaks in the most soothing voice she can, directing him to breathe in and out, demonstrating with her own breath, encouraging him to mimic it. It’s a messy venture, but after a while she seems to get through. Once he latches on to the idea, actually, he quickly surpasses her, falling into a rhythm of breath that isn’t hers but seems to be working much better toward calming him down. It’s as if he’s been taught the trick before. 

_BJ mentioned something in his last letter before coming home_ , she remembers. She is ashamed of herself for having not given that last tale about the famous Hawkeye Pierce more of her attention, either at the time or in the years since. She had been too wrapped up in the knowledge that the war had ended and her husband was soon to return. BJ had told her--without much detail, that itself strange for one of his Hawkeye stories; BJ always added as much detail as possible in all of his letters, hoping to get _something_ through the black lines of the censors--that Hawkeye had had a bad time of it right before the armistice. He’d run a jeep through the officer’s club and scared BJ half to death. He’d been sent away from the camp for a while to recuperate. He’d been ok in the end, though. They’d brought in a psychiatrist, and Hawkeye returned to performing so-called ‘meatball’ surgery in the final days of the war. Had Hawkeye learned this trick in his absence--how to breathe again when all the air goes away? 

She watches him go through those motions for a while until his normal color comes back to his cheeks and he starts to look around with true sight in his eyes. “Better?”

“Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. That hasn’t, uh. That hasn’t happened to me in a while. Guess I’m a little shocked.”

“So am I,” Peg assures him. She pauses, wondering if now is a bad time to attempt a joke. “You’re not as tall as I pictured you, for one thing.”

Hawkeye’s smile is weak but genuine. Peg breathes a small huff of relief. 

“Well, you’re even prettier in person than you were on film. No wonder I didn’t recognize you right off.”

She blushes, patting awkwardly at her still-mussed hair. “Oh. Thank you.”

“Why are you here? You’re supposed to be in California.”

She sits down next to him again. This time, she sits much closer. Their shoulders touch. He goes tense for a brief moment at the contact, but then he relaxes, leaning heavily against her as if he might otherwise fall down. Erin has rested exactly that way against her shoulder many times in the past, usually when miserable with winter fever or a summer cold. BJ has leaned just so as well, after nightmares that come too close to the dawn to risk returning to sleep. 

“BJ is speaking at a medical conference. It’s only a few days, but we decided to tack on a few days more. Make a vacation of it.”

He smiles. It’s a real smile, not bitter or sad or half-hearted like so many of the smiles she’s seen from him. “Good. That’s really good.”

“Erin stayed with my parents,” Peg says, though she’s not sure why. It’s a silly detail. Probably not interesting to him.

He surprises her with his reaction, the delight he expresses at the news. “Oh! I thought your parents lived far away.”

“They used to. I’m from Oklahoma, originally. BJ and I moved to California after we got married. It was...difficult, after he was called away. My parents moved to Mill Valley after BJ came home. All the time he was gone, I kept telling them I was fine, I could handle everything myself. And I did. Then BJ came home and suddenly--.” She trails off, shooting Hawkeye an embarrassed look. She shouldn’t air their dirty laundry in front of him. And, yet. It’s not like Hawkeye Pierce is a stranger. He was--may even still be--her husband’s best friend. Peg herself may only know the man from letters, written bigger than life, but that doesn’t make her feel any less close to him. She knows a lot about Hawkeye, maybe more than he’d be comfortable with, if he knew. It’s only fair she return that level of trust. 

“For the first few weeks, everything was crazy. Erin and BJ were strangers to each other. He kept trying to hold her, to play with her, and she screamed and screamed. BJ had moments, too. Little moments that threw his whole day out of alignment. Sometimes it was some change in the house I’d forgotten to mention to him. Or something that would send him back...back there. A sound, a smell, I don’t know. Usually it was fast, so fast I didn’t always catch it. But it made him snappish. Or weepy. Or just...just odd. Everyone was so tense. Walking on eggshells, trying to pretend that we could go back to how it was before he left even though...well, we obviously couldn’t. His baby was a grown little girl, and he’d missed it. I’d had our house repainted without his input, and he didn’t like the color. Every tiny thing just added to the chasm between us.”

Peg sighs, the old memories leaving a bitter taste in her mouth. “Finally, I called my mother in hysterics. I thought we might have to get a divorce. That maybe we weren’t the type of people who could love each other, anymore.”

Pierce stares at her with haunted, worried eyes. As if her happiness--BJ’s happiness, more accurately--is paramount to the comfort of his spirit. “But you’re ok, right? Now?”

Peg’s answering smile is so wide it makes her cheeks hurt. “Yes. Having my parents around helped a lot. BJ and I went to counseling. It felt hoaky and embarrassing, at first, but BJ was surprisingly adamant about it. That man you all knew in Korea. The psychiatrist. I guess he made a good spokesperson for his field.”

Hawkeye smirks. “Yeah. Sidney can make a believer out of anybody, I think.”

“So, we worked some things out. We’re still working. Hence the vacation.” She pauses and offers, hesitantly. “BJ keeps calling it a second honeymoon.”

Hawkeye grins, an open, dopey expression that makes Peg’s heart melt, just a bit. “That’s sweet.”

Peg leans in a bit, her eyes gleaming rather wickedly. “Well,” she says, conspiratorial, “I suppose that’s one way to describe it.”

Hawkeye’s hooting laughter is much more pleasant on the ear when it’s genuine, loud and braying. He grins at her with bright eyes. He looks almost as she’d always pictured him, in that moment. Fae-like. Impish. Happy. The moment is brief. After a time, his face relaxes back into a hollow-eyed stare, his reddened eyes gaining a shine more like a fever than a joyous gleam. Still, she holds onto the moment, a picture in her mind to take out later and examine more closely. 

Now she understands why it seemed so important to her subconscious, before, to hoard bits and pieces of Hawkeye’s words and gestures, to store them away for another time. BJ will want to hear about all of it. And she wants to look at it all more closely, later--put Hawkeye under the same analytical focus she once applied to Shakespeare and other dead poets of old. 

_I wonder if it’s possible,_ Peg muses to herself _, to bring the myth--and the man--back_.

“I want you to come with me,” Peg says, decisive. “BJ will want to see you. He’s been worried sick. He left home for nearly three months last year, traveling all over the country, trying to track you down.” He’d have never suspected Chicago, though. Hawkeye had once spent time in this city before the war, if Peg remembers correctly, but she doesn’t remember how long or why. The magnitude of the sheer coincidence required to lead her to this moment smothers her for a brief moment. If she hadn’t been delayed by Madeline, if she hadn’t decided to enjoy her books in that exact reading room, if she hadn’t still been reading so many hours later, if she hadn’t decided to confront the angry man harassing a supposed stranger. _It doesn’t matter. All those things did happen. And here we are_. _But for the grace of God._

Hawkeye’s head bows. His hands fiddle in his lap, two fingers circling the edges of the ratty bandage on his thumb. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to take him away from you again.”

Peg shakes her head. “I told him to go. He was pacing the house, making frantic phone calls to your shared acquaintances at all hours. No one knew what had become of you. Radar volunteered to come and visit, and then he went with BJ for most of the trip. I think it was good for them both, despite the lack of answers they brought back.”

Hawkeye smiles briefly at the mention of Radar’s name. “I’ve missed them. That was the first thing I felt when I got home.” His chuckle is self-mocking, cut short. “All that time, all those miles. I stepped off the plane in Maine and all I could feel was homesick for the war. Horrible, isn’t it?”

“You missed your friends. Your...your comrades. It’s understandable. I’ve never had that kind of bond, before. But I’ve heard about it--well, read about it. It’s strong. Maybe even stronger than ties to family.”

A shadow flickers over Hawkeye’s face. Not the War Mask. Something new and unique to his own personal pain. 

“What is it? What did I say?”

Hawkeye sighs. He looks very tired. Peg wonders, fleetingly, if the hotel will let them purchase another room for a few nights. Or at least bring an extra cot into the one they already have. 

“You said BJ tried to contact me?”

“Oh, yes. One of the first things he did when he got stateside, I think. He wrote you a letter on the trip over and then sent it out from the base he landed in. Why?”

“Did it bounce back?”

“Yes. Not for weeks, though. You know how the mail is. They said the address had a new resident. That’s what made BJ go on his trip, in the end. He kept sending letters, they kept coming back. Finally, the post office called on behalf of the new resident. They said. Oh. They said--.”

“They said no one named Pierce lived there anymore. Because my dad was dead.”

“Yes.”

“ _That’s ‘_ what happened’. Armistice came through. We all packed up, parted ways, went home. It took years, it felt like, to get back. I’d barely even got past the town line of Crabapple Cove when this whole crowd of people ran up to meet my car. I thought...at first I thought it was small-town flair, you know? Tiny ticker tape parade just for me, the local boy returned home from the war. Then I saw their faces.”

Peg waits, but Hawkeye doesn’t say anything more. He stares out at the streets, watching the people pass with unseeing eyes. Wherever he is in that moment, it isn’t in Chicago. It’s a thousand miles away and two years in the past. 

She tries to bring him back gently, but it’s impossible. “When did he die?”

Hawkeye’s voice cracks and he has to start again. “About three hours before I got there. Heart attack.”

“I’m sorry.” “My dad was a doctor. He was a tyrant about health--his and everyone else’s. Guess it doesn’t matter, in the end. People die. War should have taught me that. But I forgot those rules apply in peacetime, too.”

“And then you left Maine?”

“Yeah. Told Dad’s bank to handle the house and everything. Didn’t give them a forwarding address; I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t even bother unpacking my duffle bag. I just picked it back up and walked out with it. It nags at me, sometimes, the fact I didn’t stay for the funeral. I bet it was nice, though. Everybody out there loved Dad. I’m sure they did OK.”

“I’m sure,” Peg agrees, though she can’t possibly know. For Hawkeye’s sake, though, she can make it sound absolute. 

“I took Dad’s car and just...went places. I don’t remember a lot of it. Somewhere along the way I started drinking, and once I started drinking I knew I couldn’t drive anymore, so I started traveling on foot, instead. Eventually the money I had with me ran out. So I started taking on odd jobs, just enough work to keep going down the road and keep my throat wet.”

Peg blinks at him, certain she’s misheard. “You...walked from Maine to Chicago?” 

“Not directly, and not all the way. I think I drove through most of Pennsylvania before I ditched the car. Sometimes I hitchhiked when my feet couldn’t take it anymore. I wandered south for a while, into Virginia. I went through Kentucky and then found myself walking north again. I think for a while I had this vague idea of going up to Canada. I had my passport on me, still. And that’s where deserters _go_ , isn’t it?”

“You didn’t desert, Hawkeye. The war was over.” 

“It didn’t feel over. You know, it might have, if my dad had lived. If I had him there to get my feet back under me, help me re-learn how to do civilian medicine in the old family practice, remind me how to be a human being again. But he wasn’t there. And Crabapple Cove was...all wrong. Every step I took, every time I closed my eyes--.” He shrugs. “It all looked a lot like Korea, to me.”

Peg absorbs this with solemn eyes. Tentatively, she asks, “Why did you stop in Chicago? Why did you stop at all?”

Hawkeye rubs his hands up over his stubbled jaw, grinding his fingertips into one eye as if getting a headache. Peg figures he needs water and an aspirin. He’ll want the hair of the dog that bit him, but she’s not going to let him have that. “I got sick.”

Peg’s eyes flit over him again, re-accessing. “How sick?”

“I woke up in a hospital and didn’t know what state I was even in, let alone the city. I’d lost most of my identification by then, so they had me in as a John Doe. I never told them otherwise. What was the point? I spent about two weeks there. I’d lost thirty pounds, hadn’t had so much as a drink of water in who knew how long. My fever was so high they put me in ice packs for days. I’d really let myself fall apart. My dad--he, he’d have been pretty pissed.” He winces as the word leaves his lips and casts her an apologetic look. “Sorry.”

Peg waves him off. She’s heard worse. “Come with me,” she repeats, even more determined, now. 

Hawkeye frowns, brows drawn in as if he can’t quite understand her words, as if she’s speaking a language he’s never heard before. She stands up, holding out her hands to him. “Come back to the hotel with me. Take a shower. Have a nap.”

“That’s not necessary. There’s a lot of places--.”

“I’m sure there are,” Peg interrupts, with forced patience. “Come back with me, Hawkeye. Please. It will break BJ’s heart if you don’t.” 

Hawkeye grimaces. “I never expected you’d be the type to play dirty.”

Peg’s expression goes wry. “Maybe BJ did us _both_ a disservice in his storytelling, then.” She leans down, grabs his hands--gently, because she’s realizing now that the bandaged thumb isn’t the only bruised, battered digit there. His fists have recently hit something, or someone, and now pay the price. “Let us help. Just for a while.”

He stares up at her, still with that expression of distant confusion. “Why?”

The question, so genuinely asked, cuts her to the quick. “Oh, darling,” she sighs, forgetting her resolve and giving his thin fingers a slight squeeze, after all. “You’re awfully dumb for someone who’s so smart.”

Hawkeye’s lips twitch into a near smile. “You know, I’ve heard that kind of thing before.”

“Then you’re clearly not a very quick study, or you’d know better than to ask such silly questions. Get up. I _can_ pull you up, if I have to, but I’d rather not.”

Hawkeye uses more of her power than should be necessary to do it, but he does eventually scramble onto his feet again. He sways, but only slightly. Still drunk, but not as thoroughly as before. Or maybe he just sways, now, drunk or not. His hands certainly seem to have a persistent tremble, the kind that Peg knows ruins careers. She holds on to one of those trembling hands long after Hawkeye is on his feet, long after they’ve descended the library steps and make their way down the sidewalk toward the hotel. Some passerby give them a few strange looks--Peg admits they must make an odd pair--but otherwise they encounter no troubles. 

The walk is very quiet. Peg figures that they’ve talked each other out, for now. She doesn’t mind. Sometimes Hawkeye’s feet catch on the concrete. Sometimes he just slows or stops, a blank look on his face, as if he’s forgotten where he is and why. She supports him. She pulls him along, murmuring nonsense encouragement as she would with her own child. 

“Watch your step,” she says, steering Hawkeye up to the hotel. The doorman’s disapproving glance is far more piercing than those of the strange passerby on the streets, but he makes no comment. Peg makes a mental note to tip the staff extra for the rest of their stay. Hawkeye _is_ quite filthy. Her own dress is probably ruined.

While she unlocks the room, Hawkeye hovers in the middle of the hallway, staring up and down the rows and rows of doors. He swallows. Something about this space is unnerving to him. 

“It’s ok,” she says, gently. “Just a few more seconds. I’m always awful with strange keys.” Finally, the door gives a click and Peg, triumphant, shoos Hawkeye through. His shoulders relax slightly as he moves into the room. It’s not big--not a suite or anything--but spacious enough for three, as long as they all walk carefully. Peg nods to herself in satisfaction, convinced that this will be very easy, indeed. 

“Home sweet home,” Hawkeye quips, but the attempt falls flat. He wanders over to the window, staring out. They’re six stories up and suddenly, horribly, Peg is glad the windows don’t open. Then Hawkeye turns back to her, and the awful feeling of combined fear and relief disappears. He smiles at her. “You can relax. I’m not going to panic or run away or whatever it is you’re thinking. I’m a grown man, you know. I didn’t have to come here, if I didn’t want to.”

Peg raises a brow. 

Hawkeye’s self-assured smile slips, replaced with a smile of a different type. “BJ really never did you justice. I mean, I knew you were gorgeous and smart and kind and all--all the things a loving husband says about his loving wife. But he never talked about how scary you can be--that’s a compliment, by the way. All of my favorite women have terrified me at one point or another.” She thinks that there was a time he might have ended this line with a suggestive waggling of his brows. Instead, he just stares at her with wide eyes, waiting awkwardly for her response. 

“I thought you were Prometheus. Or Till Eulenspiegel. Or even Briar Rabbit. The Piped Piper of Hamelin, leading rats out of the tents of a ramshackle compound in Korea five miles from the heart of the war--not that I knew you were so close to the front at that time. BJ told me later, when he came home.” She clears her throat, suddenly embarrassed by her admission. 

“Well, I only recognize some of those names. And, actually, I gave that rat-herding job out to Frank. He nearly died. But I’m flattered, I think.”

“I mean that’s how BJ _wrote_ you. A trickster hero right out of the storybooks, perpetual champion for the wounded and weary with a joke always on hand and two backups in your pocket just in case.”

“But that’s not what you see now, huh?”

Peg shrugs. “BJ took all of my faults from me, I’d guess. All my heartache and anger and fear. I bet you didn’t hear about any of it. That’s all right, because I didn’t want him to see those things, anyway. Not while he was away. But, in the end, I think maybe he took all those things out of you, too, when he wrote to me.”

Hawkeye snorts. “Not because he didn’t see them, believe me.”

“I’m sure he saw it all. But he admired you, all the same.” She goes to the bed, fitfully adjusting the coverlet. The maid has already been in, but Peg needs something to do with her hands. _Idle hands, the devil’s workshop._

“You, too.”

Peg pauses, startled. Admired? Her? To think that she’d be admired by anyone, let alone her brave veteran, doctor husband, is laughable. But Hawkeye isn’t laughing. He’s gazing at her with narrowed, accessing eyes, looking for something so deep down even she doesn’t know it’s there. Slowly, his calculating look relaxes into something warm and...well, fond. Whatever he seeks, he’s found it, and he likes it. Peg feels good, knowing that the great Hawkeye Pierce has evaluated her and not found her wanting. She hopes he knows she feels the same, for all that he is just currently a mere shadow of the legend she was promised. 

Hawkeye clears this throat. He gestures, weakly, toward the bathroom door. “That shower--.”

“Oh! Yes. Please, go ahead. There should be towels, and you’re welcome to use any of BJ’s things. He won’t mind.”

Hawkeye’s dull eyes pick up a trace of sparkle. “I know. Possession is ten-tenths of the law, over there. We’ve shared a razor or two before.”

Peg, for reasons she can’t place, feels herself blush. “Of course. Well. I think while you--uhm, while you--well. I’m going to go down to the lobby for a while. I’ll be back in half an hour…?”

“Better make it an hour. I haven’t had a hot shower in a very long time.” The sparkle is growing, she thinks. What it might be like at its full power, she can hardly guess. Arresting, she supposes. Alluring, even. No wonder BJ’s impish bunkmate had a reputation among the women of their camp. Peg clears her throat, pushing such thoughts aside. 

“All right. I’ll see you then. Oh, speaking of sharing BJ’s things, just leave your clothes on the floor, would you? I can take them to be cleaned later. In the meantime, I think there’s some extra pajamas in his bag.” Peg goes to the suitcase and digs about for a while, finally finding the garments. She tosses them on one of the beds. “There.”

Hawkeye blinks at the pajama set--white with green polka dots. They are meant for warm summer weather; the pants only go a little past the knee. 

“Is everything all right?” Peg asks, nervously. Had she overstepped some boundary with her suggestion?

Hawkeye looks up at her. His eyes aren’t sparkling, anymore, but there’s definitely an aura of amusement around him. “BJ wears these? Really?”

Peg frowns. “Of course. I bought them for him last Christmas. He loves them.”

Hawkeye visibly swallows his urge to snicker. “I’m sure he does. And I love them, too. Thank you. I’ll wear them in squeaky clean health.”

“Good,” she says, shortly, making her way toward the room door. She pauses with her hand on the knob, turning back. Hawkeye pauses, his hands already fisted in the hem of his suit jacket, pulling at it with too much force. “Later, I’m going to cut your hair. You look even more scraggly than BJ did when he first got back.”

“Ah, yes. BJ’s small act of rebellion in a land beyond reason, I think. He didn’t touch a pair of scissors for months towards the end.”

Peg nods. She’d assumed as much at the time. She’s been cutting BJ’s hair once a month ever since his return. The mustache she could tolerate--even love, after a while, simply because it is a part of BJ’s face. But when a man’s own hats won’t fit over his head, something must be done. Hawkeye doesn’t even own a hat, anymore. She makes a mental note--so many mental notes! She’s going to have to start writing things down--to get him another the next time she goes out. “See you soon,” she says, and leaves Hawkeye to his own devices. 

\--

Their very first (official) date, BJ asked her to wait for him outside of the place they’d first met--an old laundromat not far from Peg’s temporary apartment. After graduation, Peg had been hesitant to leave Pennsylvania. Her only option was to return home to Oklahoma, and something about the idea of returning to the too-small confines of her parents’ home after so many years of freedom rankled. When one of her classmates had suggested they and a few other girls split the rent on an apartment, Peg jumped at the chance. It was a craggy, creaky old place, and it had no laundry room of its own. Peg loved it.

BJ, a baby-faced med student, had been attending a medical conference with one of his mentors at the time. While his chaperones had stayed at a fine hotel, BJ and his fellow students were booted out to the edge of the city to stay in what BJ would later wryly call “a hovel that longed to be a flea trap.” Due to a series of circumstances (circumstances BJ would relate with great animation over their initial meeting, causing Peg to laugh so hard she couldn’t breathe), BJ Hunnicutt had found himself in need of a washing machine in the early hours of a quiet Saturday morning, and Peg’s preferred laundromat happened to be the closest to his motel.

They met purely by chance, and Peg often pauses, now, to thank her lucky stars that Mary-Ellen had been so insistent that it was Peggy’s turn to do the laundry that week, even though she’d already done the laundry _and_ the dishes the week before.

The night of their date, Peg waited alone outside of the laundromat for ten minutes past the agreed on hour that night, fretting as the seconds ticked by, certain that something terrible had happened to BJ. It never once occurred to her that he might stand her up, however. He wasn’t that kind of man.

Then, from down the street came a loud, animalistic roar. Peg stood on her tiptoes, anxious to get a better look at the sleek, black machine that raced toward her. Later, she would realize that BJ had assumed he’d have to coax her into it--that he’d spend the first several minutes with her there out on the sidewalk, assuring her that the beautiful bike was safe and that he’d go _real_ slow. She felt no remorse, in those later hours, for not playing along with his misjudgement of her character. BJ could be such a _man_ , sometimes.

“Oh, she’s beautiful!” Peg had crooned, slipping easily onto the seat behind BJ, looping her arms comfortably--but not too tightly--around his waist. Papa had kept a bike much like it in the toolshed, always covered up and set discreetly out of her mother’s line of sight. Peg had learned how to start it up all on her own at the tender age of six. BJ, stunned into silence, had simply gunned the engine of the motorcycle and gotten them on their way. Peg leaned in against his back, shouting “go _faster!_ ” until they reached their destination, both equally windblown and bright eyed in the aftermath. 

When BJ recounts this story to their shared friends over dinner, after their engagement but before the wedding, Peg laughs with delight and declares that she merely appreciates things that make her heart race--and she grins meaningfully at BJ all the while. 

\--

No one answers the door when she knocks. Peg tamps down the ensuing flash of panic and uses her key, letting herself in. The room is dark, all the lights off and the heavy curtains drawn. Where she’d half expected something awful, however, she only finds peace. Hawkeye curls up like a comma in the middle of the hotel bed, lying on top of the sheets. He’s wearing the borrowed pajamas. They fit badly, but they’ll do. He’s still a bit shower damp but at least he’s clean. He’d taken the time to shave, and his cheeks look all the more hollow for the loss of the dark stubble there. His hair curls a little when wet. He looks...not _really_ peaceful--Peg imagines if she makes any noise at all he’ll be jumping out of the bed and on to his feet--but content, at least. It’s a start.

Peg slips out of her heels and pads over to the nightstand. She scribbles a note in big, capital letters on a piece of pilfered paper and slips the page half under the crack in the door. With any luck, BJ will notice it and take the message to heart. Then, she sits in the high-backed, uncomfortable chair near the curtained window. It’s too dim in the room to read, and she dare not try to occupy her time with anything else. So, she pulls her feet up on the seat and rests her chin on her knees, content to doze and watch Hawkeye until BJ gets back.

She thinks she hears the soft scrape of a key in the lock, once, but the sound stops and she drifts off again in the silence that follows.

Not too long later, the doorknob turns and she wakes up completely. BJ enters on tiptoes, a stricken look on his face and--God bless the man--the requested bags of supplies hanging loosely from his hands. He comes to a complete, abrupt stop and stares at the bed, eyes wide and disbelieving. 

Peg vacates her chair--her back protests mildly, unused to such poor treatment--and gently takes the paper bags from her husband’s grasp. They can wait. She pulls at BJ’s shirt cuff, tugging him into the bathroom and shutting the door softly behind them. BJ sinks, weak kneed, onto the edge of the bath. Peg leans against the sink, waiting. 

“How--?” he beings, but trails off. 

“I found him at the library,” Peg says. She can’t quite keep the soft burr of triumph out of her voice. _See? Aren’t you glad I’m such a bookworm, after all?_

“The library. In Chicago.” BJ’s voice is flat. He stares, unseeing, at the tiled wall opposite.

“I think he frequents there often,” Peg says, because she’s afraid of saying too much, of overwhelming him completely with the truth. He looks pale. 

“How long--?”

“I’m not sure. A while. He said he travelled, for a time. Probably a few months, I’d think. But then he ended up here, and he stayed.”

“Chicago,” BJ repeats. He blinks, meets her eyes. His expression is so hangdog that she finds herself squeezing in beside him on the edge of the tiny tub, wrapping her arms around him, laying her head against his shoulder. “What is he doing?”

She’s not sure if he means ‘what is he doing _here_ ’ or ‘what does he _do_ here,’ but the answer is roughly the same, so it doesn’t matter. “His father’s death rattled him very badly. He didn’t know where to go. He...he just lives here, BJ.”

“Is he--does he practice somewhere nearby?” He sounds so confused, as well he should. Peg can process Hawkeye’s fall from grace more easily. He’s just a story to her, a legend who fell to earth and shattered himself all to pieces in the process. But to BJ, Hawkeye Pierce is a friend, a brave man and a talented doctor who once had his whole future ahead of him. BJ frowns. “Why’s he _sleeping_?” Not ‘why is he sleeping _here_ ,’ Peg notices, which is a good sign for her plans. 

“I don’t think he sleeps much,” Peg says, carefully. “He was very tired.”

BJ’s eyes slide over to the pile of Hawkeye’s discarded clothes for the first time. He leans forward, picking up the stiff suit jacket by its collar with two fingers. He’s not disgusted, she knows. He’s just exhibiting a doctor’s caution, avoiding potential contamination. Peg wonders how long it will be before he notices the similar smears of old dirt across her own floral-print dress. 

“What--?” BJ pauses. “This is Hawkeye’s suit. The only one he had with him in Korea. He kept talking about it, how it was probably so out of fashion after three years, how even the bumpkins back home were going to laugh at the shape of his lapels. He actually...he actually said he might miss the simplicity of wearing fatigues. That’s how I knew we were really going home. That he could admit something like that.”

Peg gently pulls the ruined clothes from BJ’s hands and sets them back down on the tiled bathroom floor. “I told him I’d have them cleaned. But I think I’ll just throw them out. I’m sure he’s washed them himself at some point, but one more round with a box of detergent will probably dissolve it into threads. Do you know his size well enough to help me buy a replacement? Something in gray, I think. He’s right. That brown is out of season.”

“Peg,” BJ says, and she can see the truth of the thing in his eyes, even if he doesn’t know as many details as she. He reaches out, grabs her wrists like a drowning man reaching for shore. He doesn’t seem to know what to say, what to ask. He just stares at her, a thousand words on his tongue and nothing said. 

“It’s fine,” she assures him. She’s fifteen steps ahead of both of the men, her mental to-do list growing rather long. She shrugs at her husband slightly and says, brightly, “If I call my father and ask him for a loan, I’m sure the airline will let us add another seat for the flight back. The guest room will need aired out. Maybe Mom can stop by the house and open up the windows before we arrive.”

BJ’s stunned expression, lost and drowning, shatters into a thousand small pieces, leaving him grinning fiercely, tears in his eyes. He hugs her so tightly she cannot breathe. “Thank you,” he says, and he says it over and over again, the only word of all his thousands that knows where to go. The rhythm of the words reminds her of a song, something familiar and kind. 

A knock sounds, soft and apologetic, on the bathroom door. Peg pulls away from the tight embrace and opens it wide. Hawkeye looks sleep-mussed and on the edge of panic, his too-long hair sticking up on end, his eyes darting wildly from Peg and BJ and back again. “Sorry,” he begins, “I heard voi--.”

Peg steps neatly aside as BJ buffaloes past her in the small space. His hug is so fierce that both men stumble backward a few steps into the bedroom proper. Hawkeye nearly falls under the weight of it, in fact, but BJ clings tighter, keeping him on his feet. Peg can’t see Hawkeye’s face--it’s buried in BJ’s shoulder--but she can see his thin fingers against her husband’s back, digging in hard. 

She moves around them quietly and turns her own attentions to the bags that BJ brought. She sets out the three boxed deli sandwiches and little containers of fruit with practiced efficiency. She balances the boxes in one hand and reaches out with her other, grabbing BJ’s sleeve and giving it a gentle pull. 

“You can finish hugging later,” she says. “It’s time for dinner. Hawkeye, do you prefer roast beef, turkey, or ham? I don’t mind any of it, and BJ will eat anything covered in enough mustard, so don’t be shy.”

Hawkeye ends up picking the roast beef. He devours his own sandwich and then half of BJ’s turkey on rye besides. BJ doesn’t mind or even seem to notice. He’s too busy staring openly at his friend to bother with eating, anyway. Peg makes a footnote in her mental notebook; they’ll have to expand the grocery budget. Not forever, maybe, but at least for the first few months. 

The conversation struggles to take off the ground. Peg fills the empty silences with her own chatter, talking about her impromptu breakfast with Madeline--BJ doesn’t even make a comment about her new friend at all, which just proves he’s not actually listening--the beauty of the Chicago Public Library, the books she’d perused and read while she was there. She tries to nudge BJ into speaking by bringing up the conference, but aside from a few brief statements, he doesn’t quite engage. 

Peg finishes her sandwich, throws away the trash, and goes to slip her heels back on.

It’s Hawkeye whose eyes follow her movements, who lifts his head in alarm and asks, with a tone of forced disinterest, “Where are you going?”

Peg gives her toes a wiggle in her shoes. “I’ll be back soon.” Hawkeye looks like he’s half-tempted to sit on her in an effort to keep her there. BJ’s expression is an exact copy, which makes her want to laugh. She refrains. Barely. “Have fun!”

She stands outside the closed door for a long time. Part of her is tempted to press her ear to it, but she doesn’t. She lingers in the hall for a while anyway, not sure what to do with herself. Then, the lightning of inspiration strikes. She makes her way swiftly to the elevators, hoping to catch the phones downstairs available for use.

The not-yet-familiar code sounds strange as she requests it of the operator, but it must be right, because Madeline sounds just the same as she had that morning, though faintly tinny over the wire. 

“Wow, kid, I didn’t think you’d call this soon!”

“I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all, not at all. You need a tour guide, after all? I know a great restaurant you and the husband might like.”

“No, thanks. We’ve already eaten. Actually, my husband is...occupied, currently. I’m on my own and looking for something to do for a few hours. Are you free?”

“You bet! Hey, you’re staying at the Drake, right? There’s a great bar a few blocks from there. I can meet you in fifteen minutes.”

Peg wraps the wire of the phone around her fingers. She’s no wallflower, not really, but she hasn’t gone out for drinks with a friend since before she was married. She hopes she remembers how. “Sure! Don’t bring your pocketbook, either. It’s my treat. ‘Bye!”

\--

To her credit, the first words Madeline says to her are “How’d you like the library?”...followed immediately by “Hey, what happened to your frock? Did you take a tumble?”

Peg wishes she’d thought to take the time to change before going out. She sits down with Madeline at a cozy table in the back corner, rubbing at the stripes of dirt with ineffectual fingers. “Oh, I forgot. Sorry, I must look a real fright!”

Madeline waves her off. “I work with greasemonkey types all day, sweetie. I’ve seen worse. Here, wait a minute.” Madeline waves down a waiter and orders them both sweet-sounding drinks and a big glass of seltzer water with a side dish of salt. “Trust me, it’ll get that out in no time, as long as you don’t mind leaving here damp.”

Peg blots at the stains with her wetted napkin while they chat. 

“So, really, did you fall down? I know the streets of Chicago can get awful dirty. It’s all that industrial soot.”

“No. It’s a long story.”

Madeline looks at her knowingly. “We’ve got time, don’t we? A few hours, I think you said.”

Peg suddenly feels guilty. Hawkeye’s story isn’t hers to share, especially not with a woman she’d only met earlier that day. Then again, Madeline might be the best person _to_ speak to about it all. She’s practically a stranger. She’ll never meet Hawkeye or even BJ, most likely. Where’s the harm?

“Did you ever think about joining the war effort, Madeline?”

“What, like join up with the military? Nah, not me. During the last one I figured my talents were better served by getting that business degree and putting it to use here on the homefront. Then the war ended pretty quick after I got my first gig, anyway.”

“What about for Korea?” Madeline’s eyebrows jumped. “For a ‘police action’? No way.”

“But so many men were getting drafted, just like in any war,” Peg argues. 

“Sure. But, again, I figured it was better for me to stay in my factory. My girls do good work, you know. Important work.”

Peg nods. “Of course. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. I just...I don’t know. I’m thinking about the war--about Korea, I mean--a lot, today.”

“Why?”

Peg dithers. “My husband was stationed there.”

“You said he’s a doctor.”

“He is. He was in a M.A.S.H unit. For two years.”

Madeline winces. “That’s rough stuff. I’m sorry.”

Peg offers her a smile. “It’s ok. Really it is. BJ came back, and he’s doing fine.”

Madeline tilts her head at Peg in inquiry, taking a long sip of her drink before speaking. “Peggy, don’t get me wrong, but I feel like a dentist; I’m pulling teeth. If you don’t really want to talk about it--or if you just want to talk about something else for a while--.”

Peg shakes her head, lifting a hand in apology. “It’s just been a busy day. I’m starting to question if I’m doing the right thing. Or if I should be speaking out of turn.”

Madeline taps her fingers--square, dense, no polish on her short nails--against the back of Peg’s other hand. “Whatever is going on seems to have you pretty ruffled. If it’s going to make you feel better, I think you should talk to someone about it. Doesn’t have to be me, but I figure you must not have any other options out here.”

Peg smiles wryly. “You’re very perceptive.”

“Have to be to do what I do. Gotta make sure the workers are paying attention. Personal distractions are bad news around big machinery.” Madeline falls silent. Her gaze isn’t expectant, exactly, but it’s not quite patient, either. 

Peg takes a deep swallow of her own drink. It burns all the way to her stomach. She’s glad she’d eaten something before going out. Madeline’s taste in alcohol is much different than her own. “Today I ran into someone very close to my husband, someone he had convinced himself he’d never see again….”

\--

When Peg returns to the hotel, it’s long past dark and she’s feeling unsteady. She hasn’t been drunk since her college days, and even those instances had been rare. Stealing alcohol up to the dorms had always been too much of a challenge and a risk for Peg to bother with it. She’d spent a few birthday bashes and a few homesick nights passing a bottle around her dorm sisters, perhaps, but that was it. Keys, she decides, are especially difficult when the lock keeps wavering in and out of sight. She giggles. The giggle doesn’t sound like herself, and she jumps in alarm, certain she’s been caught out. 

“Nobody here but me,” she tells herself, softly. The key slides into the lock. “Victory!” she shouts, not quietly at all.

The door opens before she can turn the knob. Hawkeye stares down at her in utter shock. Someone not her--BJ, obviously, of course--has cut his hair. She smiles, reaching up and running her fingers through what of it she can reach. He’s very tall. “Looks nice.”

“Peggy,” Hawkeye says. He draws her name out, lingering on the ‘e’ and ‘y’. She steps forward, trips over her heel. Hawkeye steadies her. It’s a replica of their earlier embraces but now their positions are reversed. She is the one who is swaying. Hawkeye’s hold on her elbow tightens. He turns to look over his shoulder. “Beej, what do I do, here?”

BJ peers around Hawkeye’s shoulder at her. His eyebrows go high. “Oh. Geez, Peg.”

“‘Geez’ yourself, BJ Hunnicutt.” Peg feels suddenly very grumpy. She doesn’t like the mild note of disapproval in his voice or the confused surprise in Hawkeye’s eyes. She pulls herself out of Hawkeye’s grasp--he lets go so fast it’s almost like she’s burned him--and flounces over to the bed. She tosses herself down, a mess of skirts. Her nylon has ripped from the toe to all the way up her thigh. She hates when that happens. 

“Peg, are you all right?” BJ asks. He sits down next to her very carefully. She snorts at his caution. Apparently Hawkeye Pierce is not the only man she can terrify, from time to time. 

“I am drunk,” she announces, lying back with a sigh. The room is a bit spinny. She doesn’t care for that.

“Believe me, Peggy, we know,” Hawkeye pipes up. She lifts her head slightly and glares at him. He just looks back at her. Not amused. Not worried. Just sort of...waiting to know how he ought to feel about it, perhaps. 

“Where did you go, Peg?”

“I called Madeline. She took me for drinks.”

“Madeline?” BJ asks, proving Peg’s suspicion that he wasn’t listening before.

“A friend. She’s very sweet.”

“And has good taste in alcohol, apparently,” Hawkeye says. Peg wishes that he’d stop saying things, except that she doesn’t, really. Hawkeye and BJ not talking was why she’d left the hotel in the first place. 

“Are you using your words now?” she asks the room at large.

BJ and Hawkeye glance at each other. BJ smiles slightly. Hawkeye seems to find that the emotional response he’s been waiting for, and he smiles back. The expression he turns on Peg is warm and amused and, maybe, grateful. 

“Yeah. We had all kinds of words. Four-letter ones, at first, but they got more sophisticated later on.”

Peg closes her eyes. “Then my work here is done,” she announces, drowsily. 

“For today,” BJ agrees. He moves away from her, which makes her sad, but then he reappears again at her feet, which makes her happy. He gently pulls off her shoes. 

Hawkeye clears his throat loudly. The sound drills into her head, but she doesn’t complain about it. Hawkeye should be loud, if he wants to. He’s earned the right. “Uh, maybe I should step out for a bit.”

“No!” Peg gasps. She lunges up across the bed, snatching Hawkeye’s fingers in her grasp. He winces, so she loosens her grip slightly, but she doesn’t let go. “No, don’t. You can’t leave. It was so difficult to get you here!”

“You said ‘come with me’ and I did,” Hawkeye reminds her.

“Not difficult for _me._ I meant for _you_. And for BJ,” she corrects. “Do you know how many miles it is from Maine to Chicago? Well, of course you do. It’s _so many_ , Hawkeye. And BJ wrote so many letters and made so many calls, and he was gone for so many months! And now you’re here. And it was so much work. You can’t leave.”

“I’m just going to go out into the hall for a second,” Hawkeye says, and she realizes that he’s using a strange, gentle voice on her she’s not heard from him before. His bedside manner, she thinks. It’s nice. If she were dying, she’d put all her trust in that voice in a hot minute. But she’s not, so she won’t. 

“No. Stay. BJ, tell him to stay. Sit on him, if you have to.”

BJ’s mustache gives a familiar twitch. He’s amused and trying very hard to hide it. He looks over at Hawkeye. “I mean, you can just turn around for a second, I’m sure.”

“Don’t make him look out the window,” Peg instructs. “It makes him sad.”

Hawkeye startles, caught out. He looks from Peg to BJ, baffled. “Beej, what kind of creature did you marry? How does she do that?”

“It’s a natural talent.” She yawns, stretching her arms up above her head. Her fingers hit the headboard, but it doesn’t hurt. She’s tired.

“Hawk, just turn around. But toward the other wall, I guess. If the window makes you sad.” He’s teasing. Peg is glad to hear BJ tease Hawkeye, no longer walking around his friend as if he’s surrounded by untripped mines.

Hawkeye snorts and turns defiantly toward the still-curtained window. Peg bets if the curtains weren’t drawn, he wouldn’t be looking. He waves a hand at them. “Fine, fine. Just...just tell me when you’re done.”

BJ’s hands are warm and very familiar as he unclips her nylons and rolls them down her legs.

“You don’t have to be careful with them,” Peg says. “The right one is torn already.”

“It’s not the socks I’m being careful with,” BJ replies, and something about the tone of his voice makes Peg giggle and Hawkeye shift his weight from foot to foot uncomfortably. 

BJ is much quicker and more efficient with her dress. She obligingly holds up her arms as he pulls her nightgown down over her head. It’s a bit of a scramble to get her in under the covers, but between the two of them they manage. 

“You can turn around, Hawk,” BJ says right as Peg sits up and cries, worriedly, “Oh, I forgot to ask about a cot!”

Hawkeye turns around on his heel _just_ like a soldier, though she’ll never, ever tell him that. 

“Cot?” BJ asks, but Peg can see understanding dawn even before he’s quite done saying the word. He looks at Hawkeye from his perch on the edge of the bed. “I can sleep on the cot. You should take the bed.”

Hawkeye stares at both members of the Hunnicutt clan as if they’ve dropped all their marbles. “What, with your _wife_ in it?”

“Peg keeps to her side, usually. She won’t bother you.”

“It’s not me being bothered I’m worried about. BJ, you can’t just--.”

“Hawkeye!” Peg says, using her best Mother Voice. She scoots over onto her preferred side of the bed and throws the covers down on the opposite edge. “Shut up. Get in. Sleep tight.”

Hawkeye looks at BJ. BJ shrugs and goes for the phone. “I’ll call the desk for the cot and a some extra bedding.”

“You’re both insane,” Hawkeye says, but he climbs in with no further complaint. Peg and BJ ignore him. Peg reaches over and pulls the blankets up to his chin. BJ makes a joke about reading them both a bedtime story, but Peg misses it as she lies down on her side of the bed (she can practically see Hawkeye drafting out the invisible dividing line between them in his head) and falls asleep. 

\--

She dreams of falling down Alice’s famed rabbit hole. At the end of the fall is the Cheshire Cat, who sits on a stump with a wicked gleam to its smile. It recites lines from Kipling’s “If” at her in a slow, molasses drawl that reminds her very strongly of her old thesis chair. 

“--And so hold on when there is nothing in you, except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’--” It is a strange dream, but Peg is nothing if not a polite audience, so she merely sits on an opposing stump and listens attentively to the Cat’s recitations. 

\--

Someone is screaming. Peg, in that first sleep-hazy moment as she sits up with a gasp, thinks it’s BJ, and she reaches out to the body in the bed beside her accordingly. Then BJ’s voice drifts into her consciousness, drowned out by the harsh breathing coming from the other occupant of the bed. BJ speaks slow and soothing words. Peg’s arms go around Hawkeye’s shoulders and her hands run into BJ’s fingers, which are already wrapped vice-like around Hawkeye’s forearms, holding him still. 

“Peg,” BJ says, tone still gentle but with an added urgency, “Let go of him. He doesn’t know what he’s doing; you’ll get hurt.”

Peg does not let go. Hawkeye jerks and spasms against them. If she didn’t know better, she’d think he was epileptic and having a seizure. Her cousin had them as a child. Peg still remembers exactly the steps, everything the doctors had told them to do. None of it seems useful for this situation at all. 

Hawkeye is still yelling. Peg hopes the neighbors can’t hear or, if they can, that they won’t kick up a fuss. If anyone does complain, she’ll slap them silly. Hawkeye shouts the name of someone Peg doesn’t know, but BJ must recognize it, because he flinches back. 

“Please, don’t,” Hawkeye begs, choked. He’s losing steam, getting tired. He’s so soaked through with sweat that his borrowed pjs stick to his skin. Peg’s own nightgown feels damp with the contact, and for a fleeting moment she mourns the state of it along with her dirtied dress. _There’s a metaphor in here, somewhere_ , she thinks, but the thought doesn’t last under the noise of Hawkeye’s pleas and the jerking motions of his body. He’s trying to get away. Peg wonders if it’d be better for him if they let go, after all. She doesn’t, though. She can’t. She’s afraid he’ll go too far too fast and neither she nor BJ will be able to find him. 

_It’ll kill BJ if Hawkeye disappears again_ , Peg thinks, and that is not a metaphor at all. If Hawkeye breaks her husband’s heart one more time, she’s sure it will be the last. 

“Hawkeye,” she says. She tries to sound gentle like BJ, but her heart is pounding and his fear is just as pervasive as the sweat and the dirt, seeping into her skin from his own. “You’re sleeping. Wake up! Hawkeye Pierce, you wake up right now!”

Hawkeye goes still. His cries die in his throat, leaving him to sit and pant, mouth open like a dog’s. He opens his eyes. It’s too dark to see them clearly, but Peg imagines they look just as they had on the steps of the library, the whites flashing, his pupils mere pinpricks in a sea of gray-blue. 

He curses in a low groan. “Fuck, _fuck_ ,” he chants, the profanity shaken with pure terror, rouged with embarrassment. Peg swallows thickly and fails to smother a small, reflexive sob as her spiked adrenaline leaves her and all she is left with is shared fear and selfish relief. 

“Oh, Jesus. Peg,” Hawkeye says. All of the anguish in his voice is for her, and that makes her heart ache even more. Hawkeye wriggles in her grasp, loops his arms under and over where hers still clutch around him like a cage. His skin against hers is sticky and too hot. His breath (her breath?) reeks of stale alcohol and fear. She hates it. She doesn’t pull away. “I’m sorry,” Hawkeye says. “I’m so sorry.”

Hawkeye pulls away from her just as the bedside lamp goes on, self-conscious in the sudden glare of revealing light. BJ has a restraining hand on Hawkeye’s shoulder, and that’s why Hawkeye is pulling back. Peg finds herself following him. She doesn’t want to be left alone in this. If no one touches her, how will she know for certain they exist? 

Hawkeye extracts himself from her grasp, but his fingers brush against her hand as if he understands her wild, sleep-addled thought. He turns his head to glance back at BJ. “Just like old times, huh?” he jokes, but it’s too brittle to hit the mark without crumbling all to pieces. 

“Just a few old times,” BJ replies. “You aren’t sleep-walking, this time. You all right?”

“Wounded pride. Think your wife tried to juice my ribs there toward the end. I’m fine.”

Peg winces in sympathy, but Hawkeye smiles over at her. “They’re just bruised, not broken. I’ll survive.”

_Another metaphor_ , Peg thinks. She can’t smile back.

BJ disappears into the bathroom and returns with two glasses of water and one white pill. He gives the pill and one water to Hawkeye and pushes the other cup gently into Peg’s hands. Her fingers tremble as she lifts the rim to her lips. The water is lukewarm and tastes metallic. It’s delicious. 

Hawkeye frowns dubiously at the sleeping pill. “You’re a long way from your prescription pad, doctor.”

“It’s from my own stash.”

Hawkeye looks pained. “I didn’t know you needed the help.”

BJ shrugs. “Who doesn’t, these days? It’ll knock you out. That’s what matters. You’re going to feel like shit tomorrow, but you probably would with the hangover and everything, anyway.”

Hawkeye sighs and takes the pill, gulping noisily as he swallows the water. 

Peg glances at the clock. She wishes it were later. Or earlier. She wants, suddenly, desperately, to hear her daughter’s voice. But it’s just past midnight in California, and everyone will be asleep, dreaming gentle dreams. 

BJ follows her gaze. “We can call Erin first thing tomorrow, hon.” He rounds the side of the bed and climbs onto her other side. He doesn’t touch her, but he’s near enough that she can feel the heat of his body against her shoulder blades. 

Peg says nothing. She’s still touching Hawkeye’s hand, her fingertips light against his skin. She wonders if she should stop, now. If it’s impolite or inappropriate now that the terror of the moment has passed. Perhaps, if their lives were different. But she sits now between two men with War Masks resting, ever ready, over their heads, and that means all bets are off. She picks up Hawkeye’s hand and holds it up between them, studying his fingers. BJ rewrapped his thumb while she was gone, it seems. The new bandage is almost painfully white. The other fingers sport old scars, some more faded than others. BJ has similar marks. It’s laughable to her that anyone might ever think of a surgeon’s hands as delicate or soft. 

“Maybe you should take the cot,” BJ tells her. “In case the sleeping pill isn’t enough.” He doesn’t want her to have to help him hold his friend down again. He probably wants to pick her up and remove her from this bed entirely. She bets if he could he’d buffalo her off into another room. Another state, even. Hell, another country, like it was before. Hawkeye and Hunnicutt, brothers in arms, their War Masks clutched in each other’s hands. Peg Hadden, single mother, far across an ocean and wearing her smile like a shroud. 

“Beej,” Hawkeye says, softly. He can see Peg’s face. BJ can’t. Whatever Hawkeye sees there, it makes his eyes sad, and his hand tightens around hers. “Let me take the cot. You should be near each other.”

This is closer to what she wants, and she appreciates the gesture, but it brings her no real peace. _It can’t be like this_ , she thinks, watching all of her plans go to dust under the weight of reality. They can’t bring Hawkeye into their home this way, not if he ends up standing alone, nose pressed to the glass of their lives like a child at a shop window display. _Not just_ his _nose. It’ll be my nose, too, sometimes. They need each other, too, just as much as I need BJ._ She wonders, worriedly, which of the two of them will find themselves left out on the wrong side of the window more often. 

“No one gets the cot,” Peg says.

Hawkeye’s eyebrows draw together in puzzlement. Behind her, BJ puts a hand on her shoulder in question. 

“All right,” Hawkeye draws out, slowly. “So which of us ends up on the floor?”

“No one,” Peg says, and she puts more certainty into her voice, now. If they’re going to do this right, they have to start right now. Forget noses at windows. Everyone has a place in this store.

_Messy metaphors everywhere I turn_. She’s always preferred straight talk. Literary analysis is all fine and good, but in real life, it pays to speak plain. 

“I don’t want anyone in this room to be a third wheel.”

“Peg,” BJ says. He sounds nervous. Worried about her state of mind, maybe. He hasn’t seen her to-do list, yet. He doesn’t understand what it does to a woman to be alone for two years (not just two--she’s been on her own this whole time, even with BJ right there), counting the days and watching the walls close in. He doesn’t realize the lengths she will go to to never be left alone again.

“What’s going on?” Hawkeye blurts out. He’s looking wild. His eyes dart over her shoulder to look at BJ. Peg can feel her husband shrug helplessly in return. 

“Hawkeye, BJ and I want you to come back with us to California.” She pauses. “You don’t have to,” she assures, because that feels like the right thing to say, “But we would like it very much.”

Hawkeye’s lost, plaintive “why?” is familiar. 

“Geez, Hawk, isn’t it obvious?” BJ cuts in. Then he seems to regret his harsh words. His tone gentles. “Don’t you want a place to go?”

“I don’t need your charity,” Hawkeye says, giving Peg _deja vu_. Another token protest, even weaker than his first.

“It’s not charity. You’re my friend,” BJ says, as if that’s all that is required. And for BJ, it is. Peg knows this. It’s been enough before. Radar O’Reilly had spent a few months sleeping in their guest room during the war. The boy had held Erin on his lap, taken turns with Peg to make dinner and was, for a brief time, part of her home. Radar and BJ were friends, and Radar had had nowhere else to go. She hadn’t needed to hear any more than that.

Radar left the shelter of her home long before the war ended. He hadn’t needed her, anymore. He was ready to move on, and she was proud of him for it. When they’d hugged goodbye, she’d ruffled his hair and told him to call soon and waved him away with a big, fixed smile. Then she’d put Erin down for a nap, sunk onto the empty couch, and sobbed her heart out until the tears would no longer come. It was the first time and the last time she allowed herself to cry in all the time that BJ was away.

“What would I do in California?” Hawkeyes asks. His hands fly away from Peg’s, gesturing emphatically, adding emphasis to his irritation at the suggestion. 

“More than you’re doing in Chicago,” BJ replies, sharp and cutting to the quick.

Peg tenses. She can feel violence brewing here just as she had in the reading room of the public library. 

“Hawkeye,” Peg interrupts. “It’s a terrible thing to be alone. I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. Especially not my husband’s best friend.”

He looks away from his locked, unblinking staring contest with BJ and at her face, instead. “You really mean that.” It’s not a question. It’s a statement, made in a tone of awe. “You’re a really odd woman, Peg.”

She doesn’t deny it. War has made them all strange. _We’re all mad, here_.

“It’s going to be like this,” Hawkeye gestures to himself head to toe, “all the time. You understand that, right? All the nightmares, all the paranoia, everything. I’ve got delayed battle fatigue. It’s so textbook I’d be shocked if my photograph doesn’t show up in the dictionary definition someday. I thought I was fine, but the war chewed me up and spat me out, Peg, just like that librarian’s kid.”

“Not like him,” Peg argues. 

“No,” Hawkeye agrees. “Worse.”

“Maybe, before. Because you were lost. Because you didn’t have anyone to help you. You’re not lost, now. I found you.” 

Hawkeye looks at BJ, helpless in the face of Peg’s insistence. “I don’t know what to do.” He sounds frustrated. 

“Doesn’t seem like a hard decision to me, Hawk. You can stay here, if you want. Or you can stay with us.”

“For how long? Doing what? What will you do with me? Put me up in the attic like--like Bertha Mason? What are you gonna tell your neighbors about the noises they hear at night, the nameless ghost that keeps wandering out into the garden in his bathrobe? What about your _child_ , BJ? How do you think she’s going to like having loony uncle Benjamin shuffling around? God, even the other crazies on the streets of this damn city don’t hang around me. I’ve stopped sleeping at the shelters because I kept waking the others up. That’s how I got the shit kicked out of me the last time. Some guys really cherish their sleep, and they say so with their fists.”

Peg can feel another sob rising up inside, the threat of fresh tears. She swallows hard. She refuses to give Hawkeye that hollow satisfaction, to glorify this party with her pity.

“Battle fatigue is variable, all right? You’re not the only person with nightmares. And it can be treated. Peg and I have the name of a counselor. He doesn’t specialize in war trauma, but I bet he knows someone in California who does. I don’t--you won’t get help, here. Not on your own.”

Peg had said it to Hawkeye that afternoon. ‘Let me help.’ BJ says it now, though it takes him more words to do it. Peg watches Hawkeye’s face, wonders if he’ll allow himself to hear what’s being said.

_If he says no, that’s it_ , Peg thinks, suddenly overtaken with a sense of dread. If Hawkeye chooses to stay and die by degrees in Chicago, BJ will never recover from it. She wonders, numbly, exactly how she’ll be left behind. Will BJ choose to stay in Chicago to search the streets one by one until Hawkeye is found again? Will he stay with her in California, turning ever inward, lost in the past, instead? _Will he leave me immediately or slowly, piece by piece_? Peg imagines the terror of it, left alone to fend for herself for a third and final time. 

“--hey,” Hawkeye says, breaking off from his response to BJ’s words, a response that Peg has missed over the loud pounding of her own heart. Hawkeye’s bedside manner is back. He frowns, leaning forward, squinting at her pale face in the light of the lamp. “Are you ok?”

Peg can’t catch her breath. She’d never seen a panic attack before coming to Chicago. Now she’s experienced two, one as a spectator, the second as the victim. It feels just as horrible as it had looked. 

Peg thinks BJ says her name, but it could be Hawkeye, too. Two hands settle on her shoulders, one from in front of her and the other from behind. The hotel room swims, worse than it had when she’d come in tipsy. She wishes she still felt that buzz now, in fact. It’d be better than this. Her palms sweat. Her chest tightens as if clasped by a vice. A high-pitched whine takes up residence in her ears and won’t go away. She can’t _breathe_.

She’s being moved. Her back rests up against the headboard. BJ sits on his knees on the bed at one shoulder, Hawkeye on the other. BJ has her right wrist in his fingers, feeling for her pulse. If he could just eavesdrop for a moment in her head, he’d be able to hear her blood rushing loud and clear. 

Hawkeye is in front of her line of sight, now. He’s saying something, but she can’t hear him over the throbbing of her blood and the high, persistent whine. Then she realizes that he’s breathing oddly. Big, exaggerated breaths. She mimics without thought and starts to count the beats in and out. It follows a pattern, one that she recognizes from Hawkeye’s own attack on the library steps. This is how he’d calmed himself down then. It seems to be working for her, too. 

By the time she comes back to herself, she’s lightheaded and shaking from head to toe. 

“That’s it. No, don’t start panting. Keep with the pattern. Seven in, eleven out. That’s a girl.”

BJ hands her a full glass of water, but she can’t bring herself to drink it. She holds it in her hands, instead, staring at the surface of the liquid and the way it ripples with the minor tremors of her fingers. The trembling is easing off. Her chest no longer aches as badly as before. The whole attack had likely lasted mere minutes, but it feels like hours to her. When Hawkeye reaches out to take her pulse a second time, she grabs his fingers and gives them a squeeze of acknowledgement. She can’t imagine going through such a thing repeatedly, gasping like a beached fish with people who care about you helpless and looking on. She’s starting to understand why it hurts him to not be alone, why he’s afraid to give in and come with them to California. 

“Where’s BJ?” she asks, when she’s got enough breath to do it.

“He stepped out for a second.”

“Did I scare him?” 

“Maybe a little.”

Peg swallows hard. “I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be. Turnabout is fair play, they say. But you didn’t have to go to such lengths on my account. You ever have an attack like that before?” 

Peg wonders if he’s really asking or just filling up the silence. BJ could have told him she hadn’t. “No.”

“Well, you did pretty good for your first one.”

“‘First’ implies it’s going to happen again. Is it going to happen again?”

“I don’t know. It’s been a long time since I had a patient with panic attacks that didn’t come to me straight from a warzone. During my residency, I was assigned to a man with intermittent attacks. The patient had just been in a bad train accident. They used to call it that, you know. ‘Railway spine.’ ‘Survivor's guilt,’ ‘combat stress.’ It’s all the same, if you ask me.” 

Peg waits for the inevitable question. He doesn’t ask it. Fine. “I haven’t had any trauma,” she says, hesitantly. 

“No?”

She frowns at him, feeling abruptly sullen. She has a childish desire to turn her back on him, to give him the silent treatment until he stops poking at her open wounds like a boy with a stick.

“Peg. Is it something BJ or I said? You were doing fine one minute and fell right out the next. I know from experience that sometimes these things just happen, and it’s hard to pinpoint why, but I have a feeling for you it was something specific.”

Peg rubs at her eyes. She’s tired. “Promise me you won’t talk to BJ about what I tell you.”

“I won’t. But you should probably talk to him yourself, eventually. I’ve heard secrets are bad for good marriages.” He’s being sly, maybe making some sort of joke she doesn’t understand. _I would I knew what it was,_ Peg’s mind recites for her, _and it might serve me in a time when jests are few._ It seems she cannot escape from Kipling, now that she has been reminded of him.

Her laugh is hollow. “That’s what I’m afraid of. That’s what made me so scared. Hawkeye, I don’t want to force you into anything. I hope you know that. But it hit me, all of a sudden--if you say no, if you stay here, I’m going to lose my husband again. And this time, he won’t ever come back.”

Hawkeye rears back as if she’s punched him. She doesn’t feel as sorry as she should. 

“Hey. No. Peggy, he’d never--.”

“He would. He almost did. I told him to go find you because it was tearing him up inside not to. It hurt to watch his pain. But when he left with Radar on that road trip I just thought...I thought I’d probably never see him again. Either he’d find you or he wouldn’t, but either way, he wouldn’t come back. Sometimes I think that if Radar hadn’t gone with him, I’d be alone right now. A single mother whose husband went out to find his soulmate and just never returned.”

Hawkeye stares at her. He looks sick. Literally green, almost as green as the polka dots on his borrowed pajamas. 

“Radar stayed with us for a few weeks after they got back, after they didn’t find you, after they’d decided to give up. Radar is such a nice boy. He didn’t want to leave me alone with the burden, I think. BJ was a mess for days afterward. He nearly lost his job at the hospital. He wasn’t sleeping, wasn’t eating. I kept catching him in his study either just putting a bottle up on the desk or back in the drawer. I thought that was the end for us. Those days were even worse than when he first got back from Korea. Even the counseling didn’t help; BJ wouldn’t go to sessions with me anymore. He was going to leave me, one way or another. Then one morning I woke up and there he was, making breakfast for Erin and me, whistling the first song we’d danced to at our wedding. He was...trying. And he never stopped trying after that, not even for a minute, not even when I could tell by the look in his eye that he was thinking about you and missing you with all of his heart.

“Radar went back home to Iowa that same afternoon.” Peg puts her full glass of water on the bedside table. “I think Radar took BJ to task, honestly. I think that brave boy grabbed my husband by his ear and told him he was being cruel and terrible to the people who loved him, and he had to let you go.” 

Peg smiles, ruefully. “I don’t know that I can condone that approach, exactly. But I appreciate the results. Some of them. I’m sorry we all stopped looking, Hawkeye.”

Hawkeye rubs at his eyes, ducking his head away, ashamed of tears in a way he’s not been before. His lips stretch into a humorless smile, all rue. “I should have left the minute you introduced yourself.”

“No. No, Hawkeye. You don’t understand. BJ can leave, if he wants to. I just--it will be difficult. I’ll miss him. But maybe I was right before, when he first got back. Maybe he’s just a different person now. Someone who needs you and doesn’t need me.”

Hawkeye’s calloused palms feel strange against her chin. His fingers are are cool. His eyes are fever-bright again, so intense that she wants to look away. She doesn’t dare to so much as blink. “Nobody in their right mind could ever not need you, Peggy Hunnicutt. Honestly, BJ doesn’t deserve you.” He pauses. “Neither do I.”

Peg feels the panic rise up again. She wishes BJ would come back. She doesn’t want to hear two goodbyes where one would serve.

“Peg,” Hawkeye says, gently. He leans forward, rests his forehead against hers so they share breath. It’s deeply intimate and should feel wrong, but she only feels comforted. “I’ve never been any good at all at accepting my own limitations. I’d love to try to live up to your standards, if you’ll let me.”

Peg’s air goes out of her in a rush. “Oh. Oh, you’ll come with us? Really?”

“Really,” Hawkeye agrees. 

The room door shuts more loudly than necessary. Hawkeye jerks back from Peg, but she grabs his arms, holds him fast. “BJ!” she says, happily, “We need to buy another plane ticket!” 

BJ takes in the sight of them, his wife and his best friend practically nose-to-nose on the big, white bed. His mustache almost hides his dumb, toothy grin, but not quite. “Great. You know he gets airsick, though, right?” Peg recognizes it as a joke, and she shrugs. “I’ll make sure to empty out my purse before we take off.”

Hawkeye rolls his eyes at the ribbing. Outside, dawn rises, small beams of light breaking through the curtains to fill the room with warm, rosy glow. Hawkeye lies back with a huff, suddenly boneless and heavy-lidded as the pill-induced drowsiness comes up on him all at once. 

Peg shuffles out of the bed and gestures her husband toward it, moving to catch a few more hours of sleep on the cot.

“Are you sure?” BJ whispers. His eyes are full of such love and concern for her happiness that it almost seems _silly_ to think that he’d ever leave her. The fear of abandonment doesn’t frighten her, in that moment. Hawkeye has elected to stay, and BJ will stay with him. She can suffer anything, now, even a lumpy gray cot. 

She stands on her tiptoes and kisses his cheek. “Don’t make too much noise on your way out. And don’t worry if we’re not here when you get back. Hawkeye and I are going shopping.”

BJ’s smirks. “I’m sorry I’m going to miss that.”

Peg grins with delight and practically bounces into the cot like a child. “Don’t worry,” she whispers as BJ climbs into the bed beside Hawkeye and pulls the covers up. “I can tell you all about it after.”

\--

In the long years of the war, Peggy received nearly a thousand letters. Nine-hundred and ninety six of them were from her husband. Two were from Benjamin Franklin Pierce. 

_I hope it’s not too much of an inconvenience_ , the first letter said, _but BJ could really use a piece of home._ Putting the video together as per his instructions had been difficult. The rented equipment was clunky and bizarre. Her dad had done his best with it, but he wasn’t an expert. They’d ruined the first roll of film and had to start again. Convincing Erin to subject herself to a third bath of the day had left Peg and the bathroom floor both covered in suds. Kneeling before the dead, glassy eye of the camera, wearing her best dress, speaking to her husband, blowing the camera a kiss--it only reminded her of how much she missed him, the flesh and blood man. 

_Perfect,_ said the second letter, nearly two months later, _thank you._

Both letters had more words in them, of course, but not a surplus. The tone in each had been friendly but distant. Maybe just a little bit ornery (Peg’s eyebrows had risen high at the postscript of Letter #1, in which Hawkeye made vague allusions to sending something well-worn and silky BJ’s way. She might not have recognized the meaning at all if she weren’t so used to reading between the lines of written text). 

Two polite letters were not enough to get a good sense of a man. They certainly weren’t enough on which to form a sense of kinship with one. And, yet. Peg kept Hawkeye’s two short letters in her special box under the bed, tied loosely with a purple ribbon, the bundle always waiting, just in case, for more envelopes. 

She’d sent him a prompt response to the second letter, much longer and full of details about the small struggles she and the family had encountered in putting the requested film together. She turned her irritations and woes into jokes, hoping to make him laugh. He never replied. 

_I’m so grateful for all you’ve done for him. Thank you for being such a good friend; I know he needs one, over there. With love, Peggy_

\--

Hawkeye pulls at the starched white collar again, expression like that of a young boy suffering his way through an especially long sermon.

“Stop that,” Peg instructs, batting his hands away. She tugs at the tie (dove gray with diagonal lines of dark gray, white, and blue) and frowns. “Have you never tied a tie before, Hawkeye? This knot is awful. You’re even worse at this than BJ.”

“Listen, dogtags don’t require half-windsors. I’m rusty. And I never liked wearing ties, anyway. They pinch.”

“That must have scandalized your patients back home,” Peg says. She loosens the knot of his tie slightly. 

“Not really. My--my dad and I practiced together for a while, between the end of my residency and the draft. He wore the ties for both of us.”

Peg smiles, smoothing a hand over the tie and down over the lapels of the soft gray suit. She stands back, surveying him top to bottom. The suit hangs off his shoulders. He’ll have to grow into it. Still, the muted color does wonders for his waxy complexion, and the tie brings out the blue hues in his bloodshot eyes. She picks up the felt hat from its perch and stands on her toes to plop it down firmly on his head. After a pause, she pulls on the brim, giving the hat a rakish air.

“There!”

“Gee, Pygmalion, are we done already? Are you sure you don’t want to chip some more marble off the nose?”

Peg turns him around to face the three full-length mirrors. “Peace, Eliza Doolittle. It was worth the wait.”

Hawkeye stares at his own reflection as if the man is a stranger. Slowly, he lifts a hand and rubs it over his freshly shaved chin, smothering over his lips as if to hold the words in.

“Oh. Do you not like it? We can try again.”

Hawkeye doesn’t answer her. He pulls the hat off his head and leans toward the glass. Peg’s fingers twitch with an impulsive desire to pull his skull away from the fragile surface, but she refrains. Hawkeye tugs at a white patch of his newly-trimmed hair. 

“I’m old,” he muses.

“You’re hardly thirty,” Peg argues.

“Thirty-four going on fifty, at least,” Hawkeye says, prodding at the deep marks around his mouth, brow furrowed in concern. “I used to just have laugh lines, you know.” 

Peg gives in to her temptation and grips Hawkeye by the belt, pulling him back. “You proud peacock. You’re just fishing for compliments, now. You look wonderful, Hawkeye. Very dapper.”

“A word reserved for balding billionaires,” Hawkeye says, sadly.

“And James Bond,” Peg insists. 

Hawkeye frowns. “Who?”

“Nevermind. The suit looks wonderful. Does it feel all right?”

“Besides the silk noose? Sure.”

Peg gives a small nod. “Good. Then I think that’s quite enough shopping for the day. You can get by on a suit and a few shirts, I think, at least until we get back to California.”

Hawkeye glances over at himself in the mirror again, frowning. He turns his attention back to Peg only when she reaches over and tugs meaningfully on the hat clutched in his hand. Slowly, he returns it to his head.

“Peg, thanks for this. Not just the suit, obviously. Everything. I owe you and Beej more than I can probably ever repay, in fact.”

Peg waves him off. “I consider it an investment. You know, I’ve been thinking about getting a job. A career one, this time. Not waitressing.” She’d quit at Papanek’s not long after BJ’s return. With his new position at the hospital, it isn’t necessary to scrounge up money for the mortgage, anymore. She doesn’t miss the work itself, but she does miss the feeling of purpose it inspired.

If Hawkeye is thrown by this apparent non sequitur, he doesn’t show it. “Oh?”

Peg nods. She watches with a studied eye as the salesclerk packages up their items for easier transport. She hopes she’s done the math right. It would be embarrassing if the total outmatches the spending money she brought in her purse. “Yes. And if BJ and I are both out of the house all day, someone will need to be there when Erin comes home from daycare. Or school, later on.”

Hawkeye’s eyebrows twitch up. “Peg, are you asking me if I want to babysit?”

“I’m not exactly asking. Why, don’t you think you can do it? Erin’s not a baby anymore. She’ll be easy enough to manage for a few hours on your own, I should think.”

“I don’t have a great track record with kids,” Hawkeye says, slowly. Something about what he _isn’t_ saying makes Peg pause in her transaction with the clerk, if for just a moment. 

“I distinctly remember stories about your excellent manner with kids. What about that poor orphan girl everyone was fawning over? You’ve even _delivered_ babies before, haven’t you? BJ never mentioned you having any trouble with children.”

Hawkeye has that greenish look about him, again. Peg frowns, but she lets the matter drop. “Oh, well,” she says, with forced cheer, “I’m sure there’s lots of ways that you can pay me back, Dr. Pierce. The first by helping me steal my husband away from his boring conference and convincing him to buy us both lunch.”

The clerk allows Hawkeye to wear his new suit out. The rest of it goes into several handled bags. They walk together in silence. Hawkeye carries all the bags out of some misguided sense of chivalry. Peg imagines they’ll get four or so more blocks before she has to take the packages away from him. His arms are trembling with exertion and they’ve only just begun. Peg can’t wait to return home. There’s only so much healing that can be done in a borrowed room in a foreign city. 

“What kind of work do you want to do?” Hawkeye asks, the words tumbling out of him. She’s noticed he doesn’t feel comfortable in the longer silences. He pants softly in the heat. Peg adjusts her assumptions and gives him two blocks more instead of four. He hasn’t had a drink all day, and the strain of his hangover and the upcoming withdraw shows.

She reaches over and gently takes half of the bags. “I don’t know. I studied literature in college. I enjoyed it, but I’m not sure I see much practical use for it.”

“You could get your certification and teach.”

Peg imagines a small, sturdy classroom full to bursting with bored, hostile faces. “Oh, I don’t think that’s for me.”

“Well, whatever you want to do, I’m sure you’ll be great at it.”

Peg thinks that from anyone else (even BJ), such a statement would feel like idle flattery. From Hawkeye, though, a man for whom so few things are really genuine, it rings as decidedly sincere. She smiles at him.

“Hey!” 

Peg yelps, nearly dropping her bags as she chases after Hawkeye, grabbing his hand and pulling him back just before he can run out into oncoming traffic. “What are you doing?” she shouts in alarm as they both stumble back. Passerby cast them strange looks. A truck honks.

Hawkeye stops struggling, but he tugs on her hold, pointing at some unseen point across the street. His head swivels on his neck like an owl’s as he stares around. “The clock. We’re near Dearborn Street Station!”

“Yes, we are. Hawkeye, what’s gotten into you?”

“The question, my dear woman, is what is _going_ to be getting into me.”

“What?”

Hawkeye points again and this time the traffic has cleared enough that she can see it. A tiny storefront with a faded yellow awning. The letters painted across its surface declare it to be called Adam’s Ribs.

“Barbeque?” Peg says, nose wrinkling.

“Not just barbeque. _The_ barbeque. The best ribs I’ve ever tasted in my life. Fresh and warm or days old and cold as rocks, it doesn’t matter. I special ordered those delicious, delectable morsels all the way to Korea.”

“ _What_?” 

Hawkeye stops pulling at her, though his eyes keep flicking over across the street as if afraid that the place will disappear. “Oh. I guess you don’t know about that. It was before BJ’s time.”

“You ordered ribs from Chicago and had them delivered to a M.A.S.H unit right off the front? Hawkeye, that’s--.”

“Insane? Deluded? Utter lunacy?”

“Inspiring.”

Hawkeye blinks at her.

Peg looks at the store appraisingly. “Well, the sign says they’re open late. We’ll have plenty of time to pick up BJ and come back for lunch. If you want.”

Hawkeye’s grin is big and involves an awful lot of teeth. Peg can’t help but return it. “Yeah! Yeah, that’d be great.”

“Then we’d better hightail it to the hotel, mister. Let’s go.”

\--

BJ seems shocked to see them, but it may just be a visceral reaction to seeing Hawkeye turned out, clean and combed, in his new gray suit. 

“Fancy seeing you two here.”

Peg kisses his cheek, witnesses be damned. “We want to take you to lunch.”

“Oh, well, there’s a lunch provided--.”

“--never mind that. We’re taking you to eat ribs. Apparently they’re so good you’d want to have them shipped first class to Korea.”

BJ quirks a brow at Hawkeye. Hawkeye shrugs in a sort of ‘you had to be there’ way. 

“Well, I guess no one will miss me for an hour or so.”

Peg knew he’d say that. “Great! We should get moving, then. It’s down by Dearborn Station.”

BJ’s eyes rake not-very-subtly over Hawkeye, who stands with trembling limbs, his hair and new suit sweat damp and practically steaming in the city air. “Let’s splurge on a cab.”

It’s a tight squeeze to fit all three of them and their shopping bags into the back of the car, but they manage. Hawkeye leans his head back on the seat, eyes closed in bliss, and Peg wonders how long it’s been since he could afford to take any means of travel that wasn’t his own two feet.

“Beej, you never told me that your wife is such a shrewd shopper. This is the nicest suit I’ve ever drowned in.” Hawkeye pulls at his tie, eyes still closed. 

BJ reaches into his own suit pocket and pulls forth a clean handkerchief. Hawkeye opens one eye at BJ’s prodding and smirks as he takes it. “What is this, a Hunnicutt family tradition? You’re going to be real light on linens by the time you get home.”

“By the time _we_ get home,” Peg reminds him.

Hawkeye pats the sweat from his brow and doesn’t even try to give the item back to its original owner this time.

“How’s the conference going, Beej?”

“Pretty good. Strange, at times. You know, there’s a lot of older professionals speaking, and some of what they’ve got to say about modern medical practices makes me grind my teeth. None of their talks about diagnostic procedures or surgical prep would have done us a lick of good at the four-oh-double-seven. You can’t hem and haw around a patient in the real world. They’ll bleed to death by the time you make up your mind.”

“What real world?” Hawkeye replies, drowsily. “You’re working stateside now, BJ. The old ways don’t matter, anymore.”

“They do, though,” BJ argues. “Hawk, I’m working in the ER in San Francisco, these days. I’m a trauma surgeon. It just didn’t feel right going back to general surgery, after.”

Hawkeye opens his eyes and stares in shock at his friend. “What? What--What on earth made you want to do that?” He sounds almost angry. Peg tenses reflexively, her eyes darting to the taxi driver. 

“I didn’t know how to _do_ anything else. I tried to go back to the usual routine--appointments, patient conferences, pre-scheduled surgeries for slow, long-term problems. I was--I don’t know. I was bored.”

Hawkeye shuts his eyes again. Peg can see his disapproval in the trembling fists curling against his knees. Hesitantly, she reaches over and takes the hand nearest hers, wriggling her fingers between his. “Hawkeye,” she says, gently, “He’s a very _good_ trauma surgeon. They love him at the hospital. He’s saved so many lives and done so much good. You should be proud of him. I am.”

Hawkeye lets out a slow, difficult breath. He sits up straight, turning in his seat to meet BJ’s eyes with his own. “I know you’re doing good work, Beej. I just...thought we’d all finally get a chance to get out of the blood once we got back.”

“Blood’s everywhere, Hawk. Hell, I’ve patched up more gunshot wounds at San Fran General than I ever did on the frontlines, and that’s the truth. It’s not a war, but there’s no peace over here, either.”

Hawkeye pulls away from Peg and wrings his hands together, staring down at the interplay of his bony fingers. “I know,” he tells them, and Peg feels certain that he really, truly does. 

The cab stops at their destination. BJ pays and they make their way--rather somberly, now--into the best rib joint in two countries. 

\-- 

The proprietor is a large, balding man whose name is actually Adam. Hawkeye spends the meal--when his mouth isn’t stuffed full of smoked meat--relating his Adam’s Rib adventures in Korea to his captive audience of Hunnicutts. 

Somewhere in the course of this telling, the waiter overhears and gives a shout of recognition and calls to the back “Hey, Pop, it’s that crazy bastard from the war!”

Hawkeye is stiff and awkward under the attentions of half the patrons, the grinning waiter, and Adam himself. BJ takes up the reins, happy to laugh along with the boisterous crowd about the hilarities and mundanities of military life and just how much it means to men far from home to sink their teeth into that one perfect meal. Peg presses her knee close against Hawkeye’s under the table and, whenever his eyes dart to hers, wide and beseeching, she offers him a careful smile. _Just a few more minutes, honey_ , she promises in her mind. _Just hold on_.

Someday when he’s better, when he’s a legend again, she’ll make sure he comes back to this place and these people to share the easy laughter that, in this moment, he can’t seem to reach. 

\--

Afterward, BJ returns to his conference and Hawkeye and Peg return to the hotel room. Hawkeye protests the whole way up, insistent that Peg ought to spend the afternoon out in the city and enjoying herself. Peg only manages to shush him by sounding off a large, jaw-cracking yawn. 

“It was a long night, Hawkeye. I _want_ to take a nap.”

She feels like a joke hangs between them, something about Peg trying to get Hawkeye into bed, but it never comes. Instead, Hawkeye eases himself onto the bed like a much older man, his fingers digging into the comforter. 

“Sorry I was such a mess back there. I didn’t expect...that.”

Peg shrugs. “It can be overwhelming, so many strangers being so close.”

“It didn’t used to be. You wouldn’t know it to look at me now, but I used to be a real social butterfly. I could pollinate a party with the best of them.”

Peg kicks off her heels and disappears into the bathroom. She leaves the door open a crack as she unhooks her nylons and rolls them down her calves. “I know.”

“You think you’re going to fix me, don’t you? Not just sober me up, not just put the meat back on my bones. You want to rewind the clock, put the old Hawkeye Pierce back in the current Pierce’s shoes.”

Peg pauses in her movements. She’s not sure what to say. She tugs the last sock off her toes and pads out to the main room again. She sits down next to him on the bed, smoothing her skirt with fidgeting fingers. “I want you to feel better, whatever that might mean.”

“I don’t think that old Hawkeye exists anymore. I don’t think he’s going to come back. He can’t. He’s over in Korea, still. Nursing a hangover and hanging over a nurse. He’s the one piece of luggage I forgot to pack.”

“You don’t have to be him anymore if you don’t think you can. You can be this Hawkeye for however long you want, whomever that may be. Who you are is enough. I won’t be disappointed or upset and neither will BJ. We don’t want you to be alone, sweetheart. That’s all.”

Hawkeye slumps suddenly over to the side, leaning bodily against her own shoulder. She doesn’t mind. They’ve been casually touching since the moment they recognized each other’s true identities. Until or unless BJ complains--and she knows he won’t--they will continue to seek comfort where comfort is offered. Others might disapprove, once they get home, but that is a bridge to be crossed at another time.

“But you _are_ going to try to sober me up, aren’t you?”

“That’s my plan, yes. Does it bother you?”

“Well, I’ve already got about twenty hours under my belt, now. It seems stupid to quit when I’m ahead. But I can’t promise I’ll be so accommodating tomorrow.”

“I appreciate the warning. Don’t worry. BJ knows how detox works. He’s given me a list to follow and everything. I’m not a nurse, but I can follow a list with the best of them.” She hesitates, unsure of herself. “I make a lot of lists, in fact. Little to-do lists to get me through the day. I have a whole list just for you.”

Hawkeye snorts. “The steps of putting a man back together, huh? What’s that read like?”

“Most of the hard stuff is already done. Find Hawkeye, check. Fix that awful haircut, check.”

Hawkeye’s lips twitch and he reaches up with his free hand to pull at the much shorter strands of his graying hair. It’s parted on the side and slightly stiff with BJ’s preferred brand of cream. “It wasn’t that bad.”

“This is better. I can actually see both of your eyes.”

“Are there any line items on these lists of yours about you?”

Peg frowns. “Me?”

“Yeah, you know. ‘Finish a book in peace.’ ‘Take a bubble bath’--alone or otherwise. It just seems like your to-do lists don’t allow for much down time.”

Peg laughs. “Hawkeye, I’m a housewife with a young child and a workaholic husband. I haven’t had any down time since I was in college--and even then, I was an absolute bore who spent all my free hours studying at the library.”

“Nothing wrong with the library. I spent hours rearranging the stacks myself in my younger days.”

“Rearr--? Oh. _Hawkeye_.” She blushes, an image rising up unbidden of Hawkeye with his hands braced against the bookshelves, pressing the spine of his conquest against the colorful spines of the books.

He doesn’t quite grin, but the unrepentant amusement is palpable all the same. He breaks the effect with a loud yawn. 

“You should sleep,” Peg says, moving away from the bed to allow the man to stretch out.

“And what about you Mrs. ‘I Desperately Need a Nap’?”

“I want to call my parents and check in on Erin. Then I’ll be sawing logs right along with you, I promise. I wasn’t fibbing.”

Hawkeye seems to decide not to press the issue. Either way, he really does need to sleep. He lies back on the bed and toes his new, shiny shoes off to the floor. In mere minutes he’s sprawled over his side of the bed, out like a light. 

Peg waits patiently for the operator to ring her call through. Erin’s voice pipes down the line, high and familiar, full of glee. “Mommy!”

“Hi, my baby. How are you? Are you being good for Grammy and Grandpa?”

“Yes! We gardened.”

“Did you? What did you plant?”

“No planting--we weeded!”

“Oh, that’s very good! The plants will grow big and strong, now.”

“Yes. Grammy found a caterpillar. She let me put it in a jar.”

“With air holes, I hope.”

“Yeah! It has holes in the top part so--’cos it’s gotta breathe. And I put a stick in it to climb on and Grammy’s gonna give me some flowers for it to eat. Mommy, did you know that caterpillars are _butterflies_?”

“Are they?” Peg says, affecting shock. “My! No, I didn’t know that.”

“Well they are! Grandpa says they eat lots and lots and go into a pocket and come out a butterfly. Isn’t that funny?”

“Very funny. Are you going to give your new friend a name?”

“Yes. Her name is Winnie!”

“Oh, like your friend from school. Won’t that get confusing?”

“No! Mommy, I know Winifred isn’t a bug! You’re silly.”

Peg laughs, and all her worries--for BJ, for Hawkeye, for herself--ease. Their conversation continues in this line for several more minutes before Erin, distracted by the prospect of watching her caterpillar eat, says an abrupt goodbye and disappears.

Peg holds the useless phone for a few long seconds before returning it to its cradle.

From the bed, Hawkeye lifts his head and looks at her with sleep-filled eyes. “Everything ok?” 

“Yes. I just miss her, I suppose.”

Hawkeye hums in soft understanding, burying his face into the pillow once more. “Don’t worry,” he says, very muffled, “Won’t be long.”

Peg takes comfort from the truth of this statement. The conference ends tomorrow. The day after, they’ll all be boarding the earliest flight out of Chicago and heading for home. Peg bites her lip at the thought, mulling it over. She hopes her parents will be understanding. She hasn’t had a chance to explain everything, yet. 

_One potential problem at a time,_ she tells herself. There’s no sense in borrowing trouble. 

Peg changes into her sleep clothes and stretches out on the free side of the bed. It’s not her preferred side, but it doesn’t matter. Hawkeye is snoring the snore of a man in deep sleep, and she’s not about to bother him. 

They are still sleeping when BJ comes back. Peg stirs to the sounds of BJ and Hawkeye whispering to each other, their words lost to her own dreams, though the tone of their voices comes in clear--warm but cautious, waltzing around some elephant in the room. 

“Hope the elephant isn’t me,” Peg thinks, or perhaps she mumbles it in her half-sleeping, because Hawkeye giggles and BJ smothers a guffaw. 

“C’mon, Hawk. Let’s go to the bar for a while, let her sleep.”

“You sure? I’m supposed to be a dry county these days, you know. No alcohol past my borders.” 

“That’s why you’ll be enjoying a Roy Rogers, young man. Or a Shirley Temple. Whichever way you’re leaning in the moment. Let’s go.”

Peg listens with half an ear though sounds of rustling and the soft closure of the door. Then she drifts back into full sleep, dreaming of elephants in olive green skipping merrily through meadows full of flowers a bright, sky blue. 

\--

Peg sits up with a gasp, heart racing. She’s alone and it’s dark and for one terrible moment she has no memory of where she is. Then it all comes back to her, pieces falling in place to fill out the whole picture. 

She rubs her eyes and scrubs her tongue over the roof of her mouth. She hates napping. She always feels disoriented and grimy, afterward, and never properly rested.

It takes her longer than usual to find the light, stumble out of bed, and reclaim her clothes. In the bathroom mirror, a woman with smudged mascara and the tell-tale markings of a creased pillow case across her cheek stares resolutely back at her. 

“You need a vacation from your vacation,” she tells herself, wryly. She doesn’t want to admit it--and, indeed, she’ll never tell BJ or Hawkeye so, but watching after the latter man the past few days has been more of a strain than she expected. 

“You just need to adapt,” she says, then purses her lips in a thin white line. Talking to herself. Never a good sign. She’d taken up the habit after BJ left, before Erin had much of a vocabulary. To her embarrassment, the habit had carried over into her public life as well as her private. She couldn’t count the number of times a startled old woman had frowned at her in the grocery store, unnerved to catch her muttering over the canned carrots.

With determination, Peg untangles and resets her hair, reapplies her makeup, and brushes her fuzzy-feeling teeth. Soon, she has herself back to almost if not quite her model standard. Slipping on her shoes, she gives her hair one last pat and offers the mirror a bright, forced smile. 

“Better,” she announces to the room at large. She then gathers her purse and heads out of the room, intent to track down her wayward husband and the long, gray shadow always at his side. 

\--

For a moment--an angry, disappointed one--she suspects that Hawkeye is drunk. But the shine in his eye is that of emotion, not inebriation. And the way he shouts her name in delight, stumbles across the hotel bar and throws his arms around her are the signs of a man seeking solace, not soused by spirits. 

“Hawkeye!” she scolds regardless. “People are staring!”

“Oh. Do we care about that?”

“Sometimes, yes. Let’s go back to BJ. He’ll get lonely.” She frowns at her husband as she loops her arm through Hawkeye’s, dragging him back to their table. “Don’t you laugh, mister! What have you been putting this poor man through that he’s so glad to see me?”

“Nothing!” BJ insists. “I was just asking some questions.”

“ _Interrogating_ , more like,” Hawkeye says. He goes to pull up an extra chair for Peg, but she beats him to it, gently steering him back to his own vacated seat. “I can pick up a chair,” he argues, affronted.

“So can I,” Peg says, eyebrows lifting in challenge. They stare at each other for a few seconds. Hawkeye gives in first. He sighs, waving at her to just sit already. She does.

“BJ, don’t pester your friend. He doesn’t have to answer your questions if he doesn’t want to.” 

Hawkeye gives a crow of triumph.

“Hawkeye, don’t be so cagey. BJ’s just worried about you.”

Both men open their mouths to protest the contradictory nature of these orders, but their arguments are interrupted by Peg’s lifted hand. “BJ, can you get me something to drink, please? A seltzer water, I think. With lemon.”

BJ, knowing he is defeated, goes to do as bidden. The moment he vacates the table, Peg grabs his drink from across the way--a scotch and soda on the rocks--and takes a gulp of it. She puts it back with a soft clatter, careful to line up the glass with the ring of condensation it leaves behind. Hawkeye watches her, expression inquisitive. 

Peg gives a self-conscious laugh. “My parents are Quaker. Old habits die hard. I always feel guilty when I order my own alcohol. They would be very upset if they knew about the state I came back to the room in the other night.”

“So you steal from Beej?”

She smiles. “A swallow or two when I can, yes. He wouldn’t mind if I did it in front of his face, either, probably, but--well. I don’t know. I still feel guilty, if he knows.”

“What about me? Aren’t you afraid I’ll blab? The first words out of my mouth when my feet hit California might be ‘your daughter has fallen victim to the Devil’s drink!’”

Peg shakes her head. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“How do you know?”

Her shoulders lift in a weak shrug. “I know.” She looks speculatively at his own half-emptied glass. The Roy Rogers looks especially syrupy. She’s tempted to order him a new one and make the bartender try again. “Do you mind that BJ and I drink in front of you? Does it make it harder? We can stop.”

Hawkeye sighs, picking up his glass and giving it a swirl. He ate the cherry long ago. “No. It doesn’t matter. I want to drink, don’t get me wrong. I feel like a dry sponge just waiting to suck up every gin I see. But being around it doesn’t actually tempt me. I spent the whole war with a homemade still not two feet away at all times. I sometimes operated hungover, but I never showed up to surgery drunk--well, there was once, but there were extenuating circumstances. Nevermind. The point is, I didn’t become an alcoholic because of the proximity of alcohol.”

“It’s the circumstances.”

“Yeah. And the physical dependence, too, these days. But I think I can manage--I’m a doctor, I know detox is hell, but I’ve had worse. Besides, I hate scotch with soda. Beej knows that.”

Peg smiles fondly, watching her husband’s return from across the bar. “I thought it was an unusual choice on his part. He really knows you.”

“Well, I _am_ an open book.”

“Then maybe you should try unsticking some of your pages. You don’t have to tell him everything about the last two years, Hawkeye. But the least you can do is explain yourself. He’s been out of his mind over it.”

Hawkeye, recognizing that BJ is within earshot, now, just nods his agreement. He offers BJ a small wave. “Hey, Beej, you want to take this cowboy-in-a-cup and go dump it over the bartender’s head? Don’t worry, there’s so much grenadine in it, it won’t actually pour out.”

BJ snorts and takes the glass. “I’ll see what I can do.” He hands Peg her own glass and frowns, glancing from one too-innocent face to the other. “Are you two talking about me behind my back?”

“All good things, I promise,” Hawkeye says, brightly. 

“Mostly good things,” Peg adds, equally bright. 

BJ sighs, resigned. “All right, well, just keep all the embarrassing stories on ice until I get back, ok? If you’re going to humiliate me, I’d rather you do it to my face.”

Relenting, Peg reaches up and pulls his head down to hers, kissing his cheek. “We’ll talk about baseball instead. Get an ice water for Hawkeye, too, will you please?” 

BJ grumbles good-naturedly but goes back to the bar. 

“He’s outnumbered,” Hawkeye says, sympathetically.

“Only for the moment. We’re all on the same side, really.”

“Is there enough room in this sardine can for that?”

Peg has a feeling they’re talking their way around something. The Elephant in the room, maybe, the one she hasn’t identified, yet. “Oh, I should think so. You’re rather thin these days, and my hips aren’t so wide. If all else fails, you can sit on my lap.”

Hawkeye laughs, the sound startled out of him like a flock of birds from a winter tree. “You really are something else.”

“So are you.” She lifts her glass at him in half a toast and takes a sip of her water. “Hawkeye, whatever it is you’re afraid of--.”

“--You’ll have to be more specific, there’s a lot of things.”

“I just want you to know I’m your friend.”

“I know, believe me. That’s what has me worried. This would be easier if you hated me.”

“If you have something you need to tell me--.”

“--One Roy Rogers, light on the syrup and heavy on the cola and one glass of water with ice. Don’t say I never did anything for you, Hawk.”

Hawkeye takes both glasses with aplomb and takes a sip from the former. “Much better. Thanks, Beej.”

“Always happy to strongarm a bartender for a man in need.”

With BJ’s return stifling their conversation, Peg and Hawkeye are more than happy to jump in on those embarrassing stories BJ had mentioned. BJ, never one to take what he couldn’t give back in equal measure, soon joins the game, offering up lesser-known tales of Hawkeye’s antics in the Swamp and also stories of Peg’s days as a free-spirited student of literature and life. 

“So, it’s just _barely_ above freezing by that point and Peggy turns to me and she says--.”

“--BJ Hunnicutt, don’t you dare!”

“No, that’s not what you said. You said--.” “BJ!” Peg squeals, practically falling across the table in her need to cover up BJ’s mouth with her hands. 

The small table tilts. Hawkeye’s glasses go sliding toward the floor. He yelps, lunging to catch them. One shatters against the hard tile floor, the other he nearly snags in his fingertips, just enough for the glass to change trajectory and shatter against the edge of the wood table, instead. 

Peg gasps, BJ leaps out of his chair to go for a towel, and Hawkeye ends up teetering on the edge of his seat, one hand surrounding the other, both fists pressed hard against his chest. 

“Oh! Oh, Hawkeye, I’m so sorry! Are you ok?”

Hawkeye’s eyes don’t see her for all that they swivel up in her direction. He mouths something, but she can’t make it out. 

Peg’s internal alarms scream out like a cacophony of bells. She watches, momentarily stunned, as blood trickles from Hawkeye’s clutching hands, dripping down the sleeve of his new shirt. It will be a bear to get the stain out. 

BJ comes back with his borrowed towel. The bartender follows at his elbow, a dustpan in hand and a long-suffering look on his face. BJ starts to kneel toward the floor, but Peg grabs at him, her hands clumsy for the adrenaline pumping through her.

_It’s like you’ve never seen blood before_ , she scolds herself, the thought a bit untethered. _It’s not the blood. It’s the look on his face_.

“BJ, he’s cut his hand.”

BJ’s attention immediately goes to his friend. “Hey, Hawk,” he says, bedside manner fully in place. It’s different than Hawkeye’s own soothing, doctorly tones, but just as gentle. “Can I see?”

Hawkeye’s breath comes in shallow pants. He’s sweating. His eyes dart around the room, seemingly unable to give BJ his full attention. “I-I-.”

“Hey, what’s going on here?” the bartender demands, frowning at the lot of them as if suspecting them of harboring ill intent. 

“I’m sorry,” Peg tells him, turning her back on her husband and their friend, subtly shepherding the bartender from the scene. “I knocked over our friend’s glasses. He tried to catch one, but I think he’s cut his hand. He, uhm. He has a phobia of blood, you see.”

The bartender’s suspicion softens, though he doesn’t exactly appear sympathetic. “Is he gonna bleed on my floors? ‘Cos I’m not gonna--.”

“We’ll clean it up ourselves. I promise. Just leave it to me.”

“Ok, but, after that, I want you three out of here. You’re making all the other customers nervous.”

Peg doesn’t doubt that’s true. She’s feeling a bit nervous herself. “Ok. Of course. Thank you very much.”

The bartender leaves her with the dustpan. Peg ignores the implement for the moment, turning her attention back to BJ and his patient. Hawkeye slumps forward against the table, elbow on the edge, hand open for BJ’s inspection. 

“Darling?” Peg presses, speaking soft. She watches as BJ gently blots at the cut with the borrowed towel. 

“It’s ok. Not as deep as it looks. He doesn’t need stitches.”

“Good.” Peg’s eyes travel up his bloodied arm to Hawkeye’s face. His eyes are focused, now, but his face is pale and set. “Hawkeye, honey, are you with us?”

Hawkeye swallows once, twice. He licks his lips as if his mouth is dry. “I don’t. I-I’m not.” He doesn’t trail off as much as suddenly stop speaking.

“It’s all right,” Peg assures him, coming to stand at his side, blocking Hawkeye and BJ from the sight of most of the bar crowd. “It’s just a tiny paper cut, practically. I’m sure you’ve had worse.”

Hawkeye blinks sluggishly, frowning at her as if puzzling the words out. Eventually, understanding dawns. “Yeah, I have. I just--it’s just.”

She doesn’t know exactly what he’s thinking. It doesn’t matter, much. Whatever it is, he’s bothered and not quite present. She’s seen this before after one of BJ’s nightmares, when the barrier between the reality of the present and horrors of the past becomes too thin.

“I’m sorry, Hawkeye. I slipped. I didn’t mean to knock your glasses over. It’s just a tiny cut. You’re going to be all right. BJ’s going to wrap it up, good as new.”

“Sutures,” Hawkeye says, hollowly. “Is--is there enough thread?”

BJ tenses, but his response comes quick and is spoken in an even tone. “New supply came in on the truck just this morning, Hawk. And this doesn’t need stitches. Don’t worry.”

“If it gets infected--.”

“It won’t.”

“There’s no iodine. I checked. It’s held up in Seoul. We’ll never see it in time.”

“It’s not going to get infected.”

Hawkeye winces as BJ presses the towel more firmly against his palm, apparently in an attempt to stem the flow of blood. 

“Potter needs to call for a replacement, Beej. I can’t cut into these kids one handed.”

Peg closes her eyes, forcing herself to release the breath she is holding. 

BJ pulls the towel away. The bleeding has stopped. The cut is, as stated, very shallow. It crosses over the meatiest part of his thumb and over his palm. Peg has a wild thought that now his two thumbs will match, equally wrapped up like stubby mummies. 

“Hawkeye, look.”

Hawkeye blinks owlishly and obediently looks down at the hand in BJ’s grasp. “Superficial,” he pronounces. “Should wrap it up, though, just in case. Keep the dirt out.”

“That’s right,” BJ says, approvingly. “My kit is in the room. Let’s go back.”

“Uh huh,” Hawkeye says, still spacey. Peg wonders exactly where he is.

BJ and Peg flank Hawkeye like guards. BJ loops an arm around the other man’s waist, holding him up. Peg takes his good arm, keeping him steady. The walk to the elevator and the ride up is interminably long. 

“Hey,” Hawkeye says, after a few long moments, breaking the silence. “What’s going on?”

Peg glances at him. His eyes are clear. She can tell he’s here, again, just by looking at him. “You had a small accident. We’re going back to the hotel room.”

“Oh. You didn’t have to cut the party short on my account.”

“It’s late, anyway,” Peg assures him.

BJ guides Hawkeye to sit on the bed. Peg fetches his medical bag from the closet. She watches as he pulls out the needed supplies--rubbing alcohol, ointment, and gauze--and starts to clean and disinfect the wound.

Hawkeye watches Peg. She looks up and meets his gaze. “What is it?” she asks. 

“What did you say to BJ that night? I want to know how the story ends.”

Peg, relieved, laughs. “Oh, I think that’s for me to know and BJ to keep to himself.”

“Peg! The suspense will kill me.”

“Nothing’s gonna kill you, Hawk. You’re immortal, remember?” BJ puts in, perhaps referencing some old in-joke. 

Hawkeye rolls his eyes. “Sure. Me and all the other so-called trickster heroes.”

BJ frowns his confusion, this time on the wrong side of the shared jest. He slowly wraps loose gauze around Hawkeye’s hand. “Huh?” 

Peg and Hawkeye share a glance. 

“It’s nothing,” Peg insists. She’s never shared her theory with her husband, before, and to do so now makes her blush at her own silliness. Must she romanticise _everything_ , like a child?

“There you go. Good as new,” BJ says, giving Hawkeye’s hand back to him. “You know, I’d almost forgotten how you manage to liven things up wherever you go. I used to think it was just wartime frolicks, but apparently the Hawkeye Effect applies even in the mundane environment of overpriced hotel bars.”

“That’s me. Hawkeye Pierce, life of the party.” Hawkeye, in a display of very poor (or very good) comedic timing, yawns.

Peg giggles.

\--

It’s a new routine that is becoming rapidly familiar. Peg, BJ, and Hawkeye take turns in the bathroom to prepare for sleep. Hawkeye and BJ take the bed. Peg folds herself neatly into the cot. 

The three of them chat in voices that slowly demure into scattered whispers. Hawkeye falls asleep first, his breathing loud in the quiet room. Peg pokes at old, forgotten habits and prays silently to whatever may listen that the nightmares will pass their room by this night. 

“Peg?” BJ hazards a long time later, just as Peg is drifting into sleep. She startles, opening her eyes to the inky darkness of the room. 

“Mm?”

A pause. Then, tentatively, “I miss you.”

Peg feels a pang. Old bruises making themselves known in her heart. For years she had waited, every second full to bursting with how much she missed him. Now, they are five feet apart and it might as well be those thousands of miles. Her feet touch the floor before she’s even quite made up her mind. She pads across the room, pulling the extra blanket with her. Her knees bump the edge of the bed. “Scoot over,” she whispers.

“Hawkeye’s in the way,” BJ argues, though he sounds hopeful all the same.

“So snuggle up to him. He can’t possibly be taking up that much room.”

“He sleeps all sprawled out.”

Peg rolls her eyes in the dark and gives her husband’s arm--she’s aiming for his shoulder, but oh well--a poke. “Scoot.”

He scoots. Hawkeye makes a hazy mumble of sound from the opposite side of the bed and shifts his weight over, but he doesn’t wake up. BJ rustles as he slides over. Peg perches on the edge of the bed and carefully lays down, throwing the blanket over herself and BJ both. It takes some squirming, but eventually BJ has her in his arms, her head resting on his chest. She can hear the steady thrum of his heartbeat, and it warms her from her toes up. 

“Better?” Peg asks.

“Better. I just hope Hawkeye doesn’t roll right off the bed.”

Like the old nursery rhyme, a favorite of Erin’s when she was smaller. _Ten in the bed and the little one said roll over, roll over_. 

“Then hold on to him, silly.”

“What?”

“Like we do with Erin when she has a nightmare and comes crawling in. Put your arm around him and hold on. He’ll be all right.”

Peg listens to the rustling and smiles as the bed shakes a bit. “Got him?”

“Yeah. Geez, he’s a furnace.”

“Oh, no. Does he have a fever?”

“I don’t think so. He probably doesn’t need that blanket, though.” 

BJ rustles some more. Peg can’t quite tell what he’s doing in the dark, but she images he’s wrapping his feet in the original blanket and kicking it down and away from Hawkeye’s sleeping form. 

“There we go.”

Peg stifles the sudden need to laugh. They are three grown souls crammed into a too-small bed, desperately trying to make each other comfortable without waking one of their party up. It’s a farcical situation, the kind of mundane hilarity that Hawkeye truly does seem to inspire in all things. What had BJ called it? The Hawkeye Effect. Peg commits the phrase to memory--it will likely be of use many times in the future. 

“BJ?” Peg whispers.

“Yeah?” he sounds sleepy. 

“You’re a very good doctor,” she says. The ‘I love you’ is implied. 

BJ gives her a gentle squeeze. “Thanks.” The ‘I love you, too’ is clear.

Peg isn’t sure if she or BJ falls asleep first. All she knows is that she dreams of nothing but comforting black silence, and when she wakes in the morning, Hawkeye’s head rests on BJ’s chest mere inches from her own. 

\--

His eyes are open. He’s been watching her sleep. 

Peg glances up. BJ is still asleep. She doesn’t want to wake him. Judging by the muted light filtering just under the window curtains, it’s very early morning. There’s no need for anyone to be awake.

Hawkeye smiles and offers her a slow wink to show that he understands. 

For a while they just lie there. BJ’s hand rests, warm and wide, on the curve of Peg’s waist. If she concentrates on the sensation too much, she’ll get all warm and tingly in a manner that is probably not appropriate when sharing a bed with one’s husband’s best friend. 

BJ’s other arm loops around Hawkeye’s thin shoulders, his hand hanging limply in the air, fingers just slightly curled. 

They are both trapped. 

Hawkeye lifts his eyebrows at her. She’s not sure if he’s mugging for fun or implying some question. She makes a face back, hoping her confusion is well expressed. 

Judging by the amused sparkle and barely-smothered grin that appears on the doctor’s face, she mostly makes a fool of herself. Peg resists the urge to find his feet amidst the tangle and kick his shin. 

Peg closes her eyes again. She might as well attempt to go back to sleep. 

A toe pokes against the arch of her foot. Peg opens an eye. 

Hawkeye’s expression isn’t quite pleading, but there is some desperation behind his forced, impish smile. He’s tormenting her, sure, but mostly he doesn’t want to be left alone. 

Peg sighs. Carefully, she lifts her foot over BJ’s and gives Hawkeye’s shin the soft kick it deserves. Hawkeye turns his head into BJ’s chest, smothering a snort of amusement. A night of full sleep without nightmares has done him a world of good, it seems. Peg only hopes that this upward trend continues. 

“What are you two doing?” BJ asks, voice heavy and slushy with sleep. 

Peg looks up at him guiltily, though she’s almost positive that Hawkeye is the one who woke him up. 

“I’m bored,” Hawkeye says, putting just the right touch of childish whining into his tone. 

“I’m hungry,” Peg whines, mimicking him. 

BJ yawns and glances at the clock. “It’s too early for excitement or breakfast. Go back to sleep.”

“I can’t. Let me out of this bear trap. I’ll go entertain myself.”

“Me, too, please. I bet Hawkeye and I can find some coffee somewhere, at least.”

BJ sighs, opening his arms wide on the bed. “You could have just wiggled away.”

Peg and Hawkeye both sit up, affecting eerily similar expressions of innocence. 

“Why, BJ,” Peg says, with mock horror, “we didn’t want to wake you up!” BJ closes his eyes. He’s not a morning person. “Go away.”

Hawkeye and Peg exchange smiles. As quietly as possible the two of them get dressed and ready for the day. Peg carefully closes the door behind them. With any luck BJ will get a few hours sleep before the final day of his conference begins. Tomorrow, they fly out of Chicago to San Francisco. 

“It’s our last day in Chicago,” Peg says as they make their way out of the hotel and out onto the streets. It’s a cool, breezy morning. Peg can smell rain on the wind. She hopes the clouds come through. She loves walking in the rain. “We should do something fun.”

“As far as I know, the biggest tourism trade in this city is an up close and personal look at the stockyards. Personally, I’m not interested.”

Peg takes his arm and gives it a slight squeeze of reassurance. “I’m not, either. How about we go scrounge up breakfast, first. We can talk about it over pancakes.”

Hawkeye closes his eyes briefly in ecstasy. “Real eggs,” he murmurs, as if eggs are something as rare and precious as gold. 

“Haven’t you had eggs in the last two years?” Peg asks, rather appalled.

“Nah. I was drinking my meals before I hit Chicago. Then I had to rely on the kindness of strangers and let me tell you, shelter mess halls? Basically as military as they come. Everything arrives in giant tins and boxes, including the powdered eggs. The only saving grace for the food is that--unlike the Army’s--St. Mary’s tins aren’t old enough to vote.”

Peg forces herself to stop digging her fingers into the thin flesh of Hawkeye’s arm. “Eggs it is, then. I hate to repeat the same place twice when a tourist, but the diner I went to before is hard to beat. And it’s a short walk.”

“That where you got those cookies you gave me?”

Peg nods.

“Then, by all means, lead on.”

\--

In the diner, they run into Madeline. It’s exactly the kind of strange, wonderful coincidence that Peg is starting to expect of this city--though, as far as she knows, the other woman might frequent the diner on a daily basis. The food certainly warrants that level of loyalty.

“Peggy!” Madeline says with real delight. “How are you? _You_ seem recovered from our night on the town, at least. Ah, to be young!”

“You can’t be more than a few years older than I am,” Peg replies, laughing. 

“Sure, kid, but those years make all the difference. I’ve still got a headache right behind my eye.”

“I think that’s eyestrain, not a hangover,” Hawkeye breaks in for the first time, peering closely at her face. “You’re squinting. Have you been to see an optometrist lately? You might need glasses.”

Madeline blinks slowly, looking Hawkeye up and down. She turns back to Peg. “This your doctor hubby?”

Peg smiles. “No. BJ is at the conference. This is Hawkeye.”

Madeline’s eyes light up with an almost vicious interest. “Oh, _him_. How interesting.”

“Uh,” Hawkeye says, slowly. “Listen, if you two girls want to chat in peace, I can just--.”

Peg grabs his hand in her own, holding firm. _No running away_ , she thinks at him, glowering just slightly. Running from nosy, beautiful women is something the new Hawkeye does. The legend she read about would have had Madeline against a wall breathing sweet nothings in her ear ages ago. (Not, Peg thinks, that Madeline would probably appreciate such a thing, but the point stands.)

“No, please, stay!” Madeline says, eyes still shining. “I’ve heard so much about you. It’s a kick to see you in the flesh.”

“What’s left of it, sure,” Hawkeye quips back, but his heart clearly isn’t in it. His eyes flicker back toward the door.

“Madeline, behave. I told you all that in confidence.” Peg looks over at Hawkeye in apology. He doesn’t meet her eyes. 

“Oh! Of course. Sorry. Guess I’m just a real glutton for gossip. Comes from working in a factory, you know? Rattling the grape vine is all we’ve got to do for fun.” Madeline sticks her hand out to Hawkeye. “I’m Madeline Sharpe. It’s nice to meet you.”

Hawkeye shakes her hand. “Hawkeye Pierce. As you know.”

“Listen, I feel bad that we’re starting off on unequal feet. You two come join me for breakfast. My treat. And Hawkeye, I’ll spill you all the beans on myself you want, huh? To make it fair.”

“You really don’t--,” Peg begins, but Hawkeye interrupts her. 

“I do appreciate a woman willing to cover the check,” he says. He tilts his head just slightly, “And other things, too.”

Madeline, to Peg’s shock, blushes. “Oh, well. Sure. Let’s sit.”

Peg lets Madeline lead the way. She pulls Hawkeye back a few steps, hissing at him under her breath. “Are you _flirting_ with my friend?”

“I must be pretty rusty if you have to ask.”

“Hawkeye! I don’t--I don’t think you should do that.”

“Why?” Hawkeye asks. To his credit, he keeps his voice low and even, respecting Peg’s obvious concern. “I don’t really mean anything by it, Peggy. It’s just fun.”

“I just--I don’t think she’s, uhm. I don’t think she’s _interested_.” 

Hawkeye blinks, utterly confused. “We just met. How can you tell?”

Peg feels _herself_ blush, now. She glances over at the table. Madeline is sitting down, picking up the menu. Her eyes dart over to the two of them, accessing. If they don’t hurry up and follow her soon, they’ll create a scene. 

“Madeline isn’t very subtle when she’s been drinking,” Peg explains all in a whispered rush. “The other night, before we left the bar, she put her hand up my skirt.”

Hawkeye barks a laugh and immediately smothers himself with his hands, giggling into his palms with pure, unrestrained glee. Peg has never seen him so amused. She wishes he’d picked a better time for such, such _jocularity_. People are starting to stare, Madeline especially. 

“ _Hawkeye_.”

Hawkeye’s amusement cuts off abruptly. He looks over at Madeline and makes a decision. Giving the woman a ‘just a minute’ gesture, he pulls Peg over into a quiet corner, standing between her and the rest of the diner, his back to the crowd. “Hey. She didn’t--I mean, you’re all right, aren’t you?”

Peg stares at him, utterly startled. This is not the reaction she anticipated. She’s not sure what she expected at all, actually. She shouldn’t have told him about Madeleine's secret any more than she should have told Madeline Hawkeye’s sad tale. She’s a blabbermouth and a bad friend. Maybe that’s why she’s had so few, recently.

“Of course I’m fine. I asked her to please stop and she did. And then she apologized and we just kept talking like we had been.”

Hawkeye nods. “Good. Ok. I’m sorry I laughed. It’s not funny, really. You just surprised me.”

“I did? Why? Oh, Hawkeye, I don’t think I should have told you about all that.”

“It’s fine. I don’t mind, and I’d never rat her out. I appreciate the warning, actually. I’ll lay off on the flirtation. I just...I wouldn’t have meant anything by it, anyway.”

Peg presses her fingers into her eyes. She’s getting a headache to rival Madeline’s. 

“Then why bother?” she demands.

Hawkeye smiles at her, his amusement soft and fond. “Peg, it’s fun. It’s a game, kind of. Just like the jokes and the puns; it’s entertaining.”

“I didn’t think you wanted to play games, anymore.”

Hawkeye shrugs. “I’m having a good day.”

Peg peers around Hawkeye’s shoulder. Madeline is staring right at them now with no shame whatsoever. 

“Then let’s make it an even better day and get you some eggs.”

Hawkeye’s smile grows. “Hey,” he says, putting his hands on her shoulders and staring down into her eyes. “Do you really not mind?”

“Mind?”

“Your friend. That she, uh, ‘isn’t the marrying kind.’”

Peg blinks at him rapidly, stunned by the question. “Uhm, Hawkeye. Have you ever been to Bryn Mawr College?”

“No...?”

“Madeline and I both went to school there. It’s a Quaker school. For women only.”

Hawkeye’s eyebrows lift slightly. He’s going to make her say it point blank, the fink.

“Madeline is not the first--” Peg lowers her voice even more “ _lesbian_ to put her hand somewhere I wasn’t expecting.” Peg has a feeling that if she doesn’t pull him along back to the booth _right now_ he’s going to say something suggestive and terrible and she’ll be forced to kill him. “Come on. Madeline’s going to strain her ears in addition to her eyes, next, if we don’t get back there.”

Hawkeye, to his credit, mostly keeps the twinkle out of his eye as he and Madeline swap embarrassing stories about themselves. Some of the residual tension goes out of Hawkeye’s shoulders the more Madeline spills her guts, gleefully putting herself and Hawkeye on an even playing field, as promised. Peg, for her part, just listens, happy for the opportunity to learn more about her two new friends. 

Madeline does pause to watch in fascination when Hawkeye proceeds to devour an absolutely heaping plate of fluffy scrambled eggs. She wordlessly passes him the tabasco when he reaches out a hand for it. “Geez. I never knew a man could eat that many eggs in one sitting.”

“If you think this is impressive, you should see what I can do to a stack of ribs.”

At Madeline’s baffled look, Peg happily explains the Adam’s Rib Incident. Somehow, the story never gets old for the retelling. Peg embellishes it only a little more than Hawkeye himself. 

“All the way to Korea! Not that I blame you a lick. My daddy and I used to go to Adam’s Ribs after church every other Sunday. That sauce made me more aware of the presence of God in the lives of all mankind than Pastor Rogers’s sermons ever did.”

“Wish we’d known you back then, Maddie,” Hawkeye says, warmly, “We could have been rolling in ribs whenever we pleased.”

“You wish. That girl you enlisted in your little scheme must have had the patience of a saint. Do you got any idea how fussy the postal service is in this city? She probably had to flash someone a glimpse of her brassiere to get it done, to boot.”

Hawkeye chokes, spewing egg everywhere. Peg pats him serenely on the back. She likes Madeline very much. 

\--

Afterward, Madeline hugs Peg so hard she sees stars. 

“You really will write, won’t you?” Madeline asks. “And you’re gonna come back and visit me someday, right?”

Peg smiles. Gently, she brushes stray strands of curly, dark hair away from Madeline’s eyes. “You bet.” She pauses. “You should listen to Hawkeye. He’s a good doctor. If you’re having trouble with your eyes, you should get it checked out. I can’t write to you if you can’t see what I’ve written.”

Madeline rolls her eyes, but she nods. “All right, Peggy. But don’t fuss. I’ve already got a momma of my own. I don’t need another one.” 

Madeline hugs Hawkeye with a significantly more careful embrace. They’d had quite a conversation about his bruised ribs and how he’d acquired them over their last cups of coffee. 

“Take care of yourself, Doc. And if you ever need an ear to bend, I’m willing. Peg’s got my number and my address. Don’t hesitate.”

Hawkeye smiles at her. “Thanks, Mads. It was really great to meet you.”

“You, too.” She looks around and then leans in a little. Madeline is much taller than Peg; she can almost meet Hawkeye eye for eye. “Between you and me, it’s good for my reputation you’re not sticking around. I’ve never kissed a boy, Hawkeye Pierce, but for you I’d be _awfully_ tempted just to try it out.”

Hawkeye laughs, clearly flattered. He looks over Madeline’s shoulder at Peg and, seemingly making an abrupt decision, puts his lips very close to Madeline’s ear. Peg can’t make out what he whispers, but it makes Madeline snort and giggle in pure, heady delight. 

“Oh! Well, I should have known.” She hesitates, mirthful expression going suddenly rather sad. Her eyes dart to Peggy and back and she says, soft, “Hey, Hawkeye--.”

He hugs her again, maybe just to shut her up. “Have a great day at work, honey,” he says, overly bright. “Give all the kids my love! Peg? You wanna hit the streets?”

“Oh. Ok.” Peg gives Madeline’s hand one last squeeze. “Take care.”

Madeline pulls her worried eyes away from Hawkeye and gives Peg a genuine, if subdued smile. “I always do, kid. Have a good last day in Chicago and, hey, if you take me up on my suggestion, make sure you hit Lisa Larsen’s exhibit first. Her work is gorgeous.”

“Will do. Bye!”

“‘Bye!” Madeline offers the both of them a final wave before striding off down the street, joining the swarm of other morning commuters on their way to the office. 

Peg watches her go until she can no longer distinguish Madeline’s back from any other’s. “What did you tell her?” Peg asks, not really expecting an answer. 

Hawkeye, however, is always full of surprises. He shrugs and starts walking toward the Chicago Art Institute, their next planned destination. Hardly missing a beat he says, as casually as if discussing the weather (and, indeed, the clouds are gathering into a dark, promising mass): “I just told her if she really wanted advice on how to kiss boys, I’d be happy to explain the finer details. As someone with previous experience.”

It takes a moment for Peg’s mind to put that together.

“Oh.” She says, and for a moment she sees a flash of The Elephant in her mind’s eye. And, just like that, she understands exactly what it is that she’s been missing all this time. 

\--

They stand before a wall of photographs in silence. They’ve hardly spoke to each other since the diner, too wrapped up in their own thoughts to bother, perhaps. Or maybe just too afraid of what the other has to say. 

Madeline’s suggestion is a good one. Lisa Larsen’s photography is the most stunning exhibit in the art museum by far. Peg feels especially taken with the large portrait called “Vo Canh - Vietnam.” The child in the photograph with somber eyes and pursed lips reminds her of her own daughter, whom she suddenly misses so fiercely it nearly brings her to tears right there and then. 

Hawkeye returns from his jaunt around the display wall. He has never felt to Peggy more like a shadow and less like a man. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asks. His voice is soft. It echoes in the room, but that hardly matters. They are the only spectators in this particular exhibit hall. 

Peg doesn’t look at him. She keeps studying the eyes of the girl in the photograph. “Did you ask him not to tell me? Or did he decide that on his own?”

Hawkeye reaches out toward her hand. She doesn’t meet him halfway. His fingers hang there, unacknowledged, for several long seconds. He lets them drop. “I don’t know. I don’t think we ever talked about that part of it. Not about him and me.”

This makes Peg shudder. She hugs herself. “Him and someone else?”

Hawkeye swallows audibly. For a moment, Peg thinks he’ll refuse to explain himself, but then he nods idly, perhaps remembering the old adage: _In for a penny, in for a pound_. “A woman who visited the camp, for a while. It-it--nothing serious happened. He was just...tempted, just once. He felt so guilty afterward, Peggy, honestly. He was wracked with it. He wanted to tell you, and I just--I didn’t want you to be hurt. You didn’t deserve to be punished for his guilt. So, at the time, I told him to keep it to himself.”

“And with you? Was that ‘just temptation,’ too?”

Hawkeye puts his hands behind his back. Then he changes his mind and puts them in his pockets. Then he changes his mind again and ends up unconsciously parroting Peg’s own stance, his arms crossed protectively over his heart. “No.”

Peg closes her eyes. She’s not going to cry here. She wants to ask such stupid, terrible questions. Questions like ‘how many times?’ and ‘when did it start?’ and ‘when did it stop?’ and ‘how could you leave him, after that?’ and ‘why haven’t you taken him away, yet?’ Instead, she says nothing.

“He loves you,” Hawkeye says.

Peg opens her eyes and glares at him. Her expression must be murderous, indeed, because Hawkeye physically recoils from it. “I know that,” she says, voice low and dangerous and trembling with her rage, the anger she feels despite herself and has been trying so desperately to control, ever since BJ’s draft letter first arrived. “I don’t need _you_ to tell me _that_.”

They leave the museum.

Peg wants to leave him behind. She wants to push him into traffic. She wants to scream and hit him, pound his battered bruises with her fists until his skin bursts open and all his lying guts spill out. Instead, she pulls him into an alley, away from prying eyes, and backs him up against the bricks. He’s over a head taller than her and even as thin as he is, he could certainly push her about if he wished. Instead, he cowers and folds in on himself, defensive and clearly afraid.

Peg sobs. All the tense rage flows out of her with the sound. Her lifted hands drop and she leans forward, her head resting against his chest. Her tears hurt as if each one is being plucked directly from her heart, like the time she fell into a cactus patch as a child and her mother had pulled the spines out of her flesh one needle at a time. Hawkeye’s arms go cautiously to embrace her and she melts into them, sobbing harder, unable to manage her breath. Air lodges somewhere in her sternum and refuses to be released. She feels like a baby, like Erin in those early days when she was colicky and sometimes cried so hard she fell utterly silent, her face beet red and mouth open in a soundless scream. 

“Breathe out,” Hawkeye says. It’s his doctor voice. It’s soothing and kind and Peg hates him, hates him, hates him. 

She lets the air go only to replace it with another loud, gulping gasp. At some point her legs give out and they end up on the dirty concrete, Hawkeye crouched down, Peg practically sitting in his lap, her whole self buried in his arms and chest. He could smother her like this, if he tried. She almost wishes he would.

After a time, her body forces her to breathe in again. And again. And her breath takes on a normal rhythm as her tears dry up. The emotions remain, but they feel muted. She’s exhausted, body and soul. She’s never cried like that in her life--not even that terrible day alone on the couch--and she never wants to again.

Hawkeye, she realizes, is singing softly into her hair. It’s a lullaby, maybe. Or an old war song. She can’t make out the words. The tune is gentle, though, and repetitive. His voice isn’t half bad. Slowly, she sits up. Hawkeye’s arms go obligingly loose around her. She rests her hands on his chest, holding herself up on his lap. She should back away, should get far away from his traitorous self. She doesn’t.

She looks at his face, meets him eye for eye. It’s easy when they’re both sitting down. His own cheeks are decidedly wet. She wants to feel gratified by that, but she can’t find it in herself.

“I’ll miss him,” she says, unable to do more than whisper. Her voice is raspy and weak, torn to bits by her silent screaming. Her face crumples, threatening fresh tears. “And I’ll miss you, too, God help me.”

Hawkeye looks like she’s punched his guts out, after all. He reaches up, places trembling hands against her chin, clumsy fingers brushing over her damp cheeks. “He’s not going anywhere, honey. Neither am I. I promise. I promise.”

“But you...you love him.”

“I do.”

“And he loves you.”

“He might.”

“Then--.”

“Peggy. I told you. He loves you.” He takes a shaky breath. “And I think I might, too. It’s an awfully easy thing to do, you know. The easiest thing I’ve done in a while. I was gone pretty much the minute you stood up to that bully on my behalf, and that was before I knew who you were.”

Peg stares at him. She doesn’t understand. She grasps for the one thing that troubles her most. “You--you won’t leave me?”

Hawkeye’s smile is watery. He puts his arms back around her, hugs her close. “Wild horses couldn’t drag either of us away from you, Peggy, I promise.”

Peg sniffs. The front of his suit is all damp and sticky. “I can’t--I can’t be left behind again, Hawkeye. It was so hard. It was the hardest thing. I thought I was going to die, some days, I really did.”

Hawkeye nods. “I know. Believe me, I know. None of us are going to be alone again, Peg. Not ever, if I have any say in it at all. I’d never do that to you or to Beej. That’s why--that’s why I was afraid when you found me. That’s why I wanted you to hate me, instead. I thought it’d make it easier, if I could just stay away. From everybody.”

Peg swallows down the reflexive sensation of fright those words cause. “Oh, Hawkeye. No. No, that would be terrible. You can’t ever be lost again. Please, it’s so awful for you.”

Hawkeye laughs. It’s a dry sound. “We’re a messed up group of people, aren’t we?”

Peg sighs. She rests her head against his collarbone, closes her eyes. She’s wrung out like a towel, she feels. She longs for the warm, uncomplicated serenity of that morning of blissful ignorance--it seems a thousand years ago, now. “War does that, I think,” she murmurs. “It broke us all to pieces and now the only way to be whole again is be with each other.”

She can feel Hawkeye’s smile against her temple. He kisses her there, just above the corner of her eye. It should feel wrong or strange or...something, something. Instead, she just wishes he’d do it again. “That’s nice.”

“I think I stole it from a poem,” Peg admits, sleepily. 

“We should get up. There’s rats over there, and they’re eyeing my shoes.”

Together they help each other to stand. They lean on each other as they walk out of the alley and back onto the busy sidewalk. Thunder rolls overhead. Peggy tilts up her chin as the first drops start to fall.

“I love the rain,” she says. 

Hawkeye’s hand brushes lightly against her own knuckles. He follows her gaze up.

“I know. BJ said.”

“We used to take long walks in the summer rain, before Erin was born. We’d come home soaked to the bone and muddy up to our ankles. BJ hated it, I think, but I...I always felt so good, after. Washed clean.”

“I don’t think Beej minded. Not when he knew how happy it made you.”

“I love him so much, Hawkeye. I don’t know what to do.”

Hawkeye shrugs. “Me, either--and don’t think it’s easy for me to admit that. But we’ll sort it out. We all got through a war alive, if not whole. Navigating interpersonal relationships should be a breeze and a half, after that.”

Peg smiles. It hurts, but in a good way. Atrophied muscles stretching out. 

The rain picks up tempo. They’ll be dripping wet by the time they make it back to the hotel. 

Hawkeye brushes water out of his eyes with the back of his arm. He gestures down the sidewalk. “Beauty before brains.”

“Hmph.” Peg loops her arm through his. They’ll cause some troubles for the passerby around them, but she doesn’t care. “As in all things, we should do this together, I think.”

Hawkeye’s smile is dopey and soft, and she could certainly be convinced that the feeling blooming in her chest in response is the foundation of love. 

When they arrive at the hotel, the doorman makes them remove their squelching shoes. The wet footwear dangles from their fingertips. Peggy’s heels create an interesting spiral effect in the water that runs down, bleeding sluggishly from the now likely ruined silk covering. Peg runs across the lobby on bare stockinged feet, trailing water in her wake, Hawkeye racing just behind her, and they laugh and laugh even as the porter follows them a few feet, shaking his fist in dismay. 

\--

Hawkeye leans against the wall and breathes in big gasps, his free hand pressed against an uncomfortable stitch in his side. “I never was one for calisthenics. The only marathons I ever ran were team affairs--me, a nurse, and the hundred-yard dash.”

Peg loosens her hair over the sink and starts to pull water through the strands with her brush. She frowns over at him. “Do you even mean it when you talk like that?”

“Sure,” Hawkeye pants, still contending with the stitch. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“I don’t know. Were you sleeping with the nurses on the compound while you and BJ--?”

“Are we talking about this? We can, if you want to. I’m just making sure that I’m not delirious.”

“Sit down before you fall down,” Peg orders. She waits for him to slide, wetly, to the floor. He leaves a damp trail on the wall behind him. Like a snail. “Well?”

“Well? Well. I don’t know. Maybe not. Not for lack of trying on my part--it never hurts to ask, and I’ve been told the hundredth time is the charm. Honestly, even by the time BJ first arrived, most of my forays with the nursing staff never got much past op-room flirting and some heavy, near-death petting after the most recent sniper attack. They got wise to me, I guess.”

“Wise to you how?”

Hawkeye shrugs. “I think they knew, in a way. Before I did, before BJ did. That I wasn’t as interested in casual as I’d been before Korea.”

Peg pulls her damp hair up into a twist and ties it back. “So, yes. You and my husband were--were exclusive.”

Hawkeye winces at the phrase ‘my husband.’ “Yeah. Not purposefully. We never talked about the...the specifics. And I still asked the nurses, when I felt like it. But now that you mention it, yes.”

“When did you--?”

“Are you sure I’m not delirious?”

“Hawkeye. You owe me this.”

Hawkeye pulls his long legs up to his chin and hugs them to his chest. “This is torture, you know. I’ve been in a warzone, I know how torture works. This is the worst.”

Peg ignores him. She reaches back and struggles with her zipper for a moment before giving it up. Hawkeye scrambles--painfully, from the looks of it--to his feet and ducks around her. He’s so quick that she hardly notices her sleeves slipping free down her arms as he scrambles back to sit against the wall again.

Slowly, she turns her back on him and steps out of her clothes. She’s still wearing her bra and a full-body slip. It feels silly to worry about it, overmuch. Their intimacy is outsourced, but it’s real. Peg wonders, idly, if Hawkeye knows as well as she does how BJ squirms just so when someone kisses the curve of his neck.

_Of course he does_ , Peg thinks, and there’s no real anger in it, anymore. It’s just fact. 

Hawkeye, to his credit, only leers at her a little. Peg is almost flattered, despite everything. The moment passes, though, and he goes back to staring at the floor, answering her questions in a carefully neutral voice.

“The first time was...it didn’t happen as quickly as you might think.”

Peg sits on the edge of the tub and waits for the rest. It’s slow in coming.

“Did he...did Beej ever tell you about the time I came back to camp with a concussion?”

Peg nods. She remembers that particular letter very well. BJ’s words had sounded so tired, so relieved that his friend had arrived back in one piece. “Your jeep turned over.”

“Yeah. Well, BJ and the rest of the staff were pretty upset about it. _I_ was pretty upset about it. I’d cracked my skull but good--metaphorically, I mean. If I’d really cracked my skull, I wouldn’t have made it that long without treatment. For a while there was talk of me getting sent home over it. But then I got better--just my luck. I sent this little girl to get help, you know. And I only asked for a Jeep. I figured Radar would come pick me up, maybe Klinger. It wasn’t the first time someone got stranded away from the unit and needed a ride back to camp. But...Radar was driving, sure. But he’d brought a doctor with him. BJ insisted, from the sounds of it. Probably would have gotten himself court martialed if Colonel Potter had argued the point--but he didn’t argue.”

Peg thought about her husband, about how much compassion he had for all of his patients and all of his friends. She understood the direction this story was going in.

“It was a difficult time. Moreso for him than me. I’m a terrible patient. And I was loopy as a biplane. I’d spent hours talking the ears off of this nice Korean family, trying to stay awake. By the time Radar and BJ got there, I couldn’t stay upright anymore. I guess it spooked him. BJ and Radar both, but Beej especially. I just walked right up to them, asked them what had taken them so long, and passed right out. BJ barely caught me.”

Peg waits. He’s stalling, telling her details to a story she already knows. She can let him, though. They have time.

Hawkeye eyes glaze over with memory. He’s there with her, but he’s not.

“That’s the first time we kissed. Post-Op. I’d been back for a few hours and only conscious again for about half of one. The nurses were all out of the room. BJ was on duty. He just...chewed me up one side and down the other for being a stupid idiot. And then he kissed me. Not--not a deep kiss. I don’t want you to--it was--I could have almost passed it off as brotherly, maybe. I did, in fact. And he followed along. And we kept dancing around it.”

“For how long?”

“About half a year,” Hawkeye says, and he can’t keep the bitterness from his voice. 

_And I’m the reason why_ , Peg thinks, and she pities them both to think of it--the two of them, lost in hell together and unable to find any solace or peace because of her, because of what she represented to BJ. Loyalty. Normalcy. Home. “What happened to change that?”

She doesn’t expect to see the War Mask. It appears suddenly, so abruptly it makes her jerk back in surprise. His Mask truly is unlike the ones she’s seen before. Spider-web cracks crawl over the stony surface in places, letting Hawkeye’s pain seep through the usually calm, implacable facade, muted but tangible. Peg finally leaves the safety of the bathroom and creeps cautiously across the short expanse of carpet between them. The fabric of his still-damp suit jacket rubs uncomfortably against her bare arm as she sits next to him on the floor. “What happened?” she repeats, more gently. 

Hawkeye takes a deep breath through his nose. She suspects he’s savoring the lingering scent of her perfume. “Battalion Aid.”

Peg’s hands clench together in her lap reflexively. She wants to reach out to him, but she refrains. “BJ told me about that, too.” She has letters upon letters full of it--the careful, sanitized descriptions of medicine performed right at the front. The wounded coming in as a flood. Only a very few leaving the bunker alive. She remembers vividly BJ’s descriptions of the way his whole world shook under the force of the bombs. How he hadn’t been sure, from one blink to the next, if he’d ever see anything but darkness again. “It was bad?”

“The worst I’d ever experienced. We all took turns filling in there when asked. I’d been there before, but I wasn’t alone, then. It...it makes you think about things, being that close to death without a friendly face near by.” Hawkeye smiles without humor. “I wrote my will.”

“But you came back all right.”

“Sure. Not a scratch on me, in fact. But for a while, everyone at the unit thought I was dead. The surgeon who’d been there before me had kicked it, you see, and sometimes the rumor mill gets its wires crossed. When I got back, BJ was asleep. Everything seemed all right. We joked around a bit, and he went right back to sleep. But the next morning, I woke up and...he’d gotten in my cot. He’s all limbs, you know. Like an octopus. And he wouldn’t let go.”

Peg smiles despite herself. “I know.”

“That’s when it first happened. It was sheer dumb luck nobody walked in on us right then. Charles was on duty, no wounded arrived. It was just me and Beej and--and a year’s worth of--well. It happened.”

They both stare through the open bathroom door, not actually seeing anything within. 

“Afterward, he fell apart. Not like me, now. I’m sugar in a coffee cup, totally dissolved. He was more like a shook up jigsaw puzzle. Regardless, something in him snapped, after. He started hitting the still too hard. Arrived late to his duties or not at all. Potter was livid, the whole camp was full of speculation. The guilt of it was eating him up, Peg, it really was. And it was getting to me, too, because it was all my fault.”

Peg can’t bring herself to tell him that’s not true.

“I confronted him. Told him I was sorry, that he had to let it go and move on. Told him I’d never so much as breathe in his direction again, if he wanted. And he did. He did want that. So I packed up some of my things and moved into the supply tent. We didn’t even hardly look at each other for a month.”

Peg’s fists clench so hard in her lap that her knuckles go bone white. She wants to be angry, wants to feel abused and mistreated. But all she can think about is Hawkeye, curled up alone on his cot in the dark and her own husband, left listless and silent without his friend there to keep away the worst of the war. “That must have been so awful.”

“It was. The unit’s efficiency rating dropped a whole two percent. Kids were dying on the table because Beej and I couldn’t put aside our problems. Everyone could see it, even if they didn’t know the details. Finally...well, lots of people came to talk some sense into me at the time. Eventually one of them got through.” Hawkeye glances over at her. “You ought to meet Margaret Hoolihan someday, Peggy. You’d really like each other.”

“Who got through to BJ?” Peg asks. Someone must have.

Hawkeye’s smile grows. “The good Father, of course. He has a mean left hook, from what I’ve been told.” 

Peg gasps. “He _punched_ him?”

“A love tap. It was enough.”

“And that helped?”

“It convinced us to actually talk to each other, yeah. We talked about it for hours, Peg. I don’t want you to think--it wasn’t a decision we made lightly or easily. Or even one that sat well with us all the time.” Hawkeye pauses, fiddling with his own fingers. “You know, the part that bothered us both the most was knowing how unfair it was to _you_. But the second thing that bothered me was--nevermind.”

“In for a penny, in for a pound. What was it?”

“Frank Burns. All I could think about was how I’d finally sunk to his slimy, subhuman level. I’ve chased women--and men--my whole life, Peg, but I had a line in the sand, and that line was I didn’t get in anybody’s marriage beds. Well. Except the once, but she was mine first. Nevermind that. Engagements were another story, maybe--that’s just a promise, and those can be broken and put back together again. But cynical, godless heathen though I may be, I never--well, I used to... _mostly_ never. Not with a marriage that actually meant something to somebody. You know what I mean?” 

Peg has nothing to say. She can’t put the feelings and the words together right. She’s glad that the two men made up, for their own sakes. She’s grateful that they resolved their issues enough to get their professional lives straight, that no more young men died for the sake of her husband’s wedding vows. Even so, she also remembers every single dark, lonely night, every evening she’d spent drowning in a too-big bed, smothered by the silence, reading BJ’s letters over and over again as if the words were an incantation that, if repeated enough, would finally bring him home. 

“I wish he had told me,” Peg says. “I know he couldn’t--not completely, not by name. I wouldn’t wish that sort of trouble on either of you. But I wish he’d told me that he needed more than I could give him. It--it would have made it easier, knowing it wasn’t just me who was breaking apart without him.”

Hawkeye sits up straighter in surprise, glances at her meaningfully. She shakes her head. “I never cheated. I wouldn’t have. I--I didn’t have anyone I was that close to. I never even considered it. All I had was Erin. Erin, me, and for a short while that job at the coffee shop.” She smiles ruefully, “And I never would have so much as looked at the men that frequented that place. They used to try to feel me up, you know. I almost got fired once for slapping a man’s hand away from my behind. I think if I hadn’t been the only one willing to cover nights, I probably would have been sent packing.”

Hawkeye frowns, clearly annoyed on her behalf. His indignation is almost funny, considering the situation. “What’d you do with Erin when you were working?”

“Put her to bed. The neighbors knew she was there. I couldn’t afford a babysitter _and_ the mortgage. It had to be enough. And it was.”

Hawkeye sighs, rubbing idly at his chest as if it aches. “The old guilt is coming back. Or maybe it never went away.”

“Good,” Peg says, with a careless shrug. “Good, Hawkeye Pierce. I hope that guilt never leaves either of you. What you did was wrong. It should feel wrong.”

Hawkeye’s look of pain cuts her to the quick. She reaches out, grips his hand. “Not you and BJ, sweetie. I don’t mean--I just wish I’d _known_. I don’t think it would have helped, really, but I wish he’d told me when he came back, at least. It’s all so new, so fresh, even though it’s years ago, now. I feel cut up to ribbons, and here you are, standing in the blood, your fingers poking around in the wounds.”

Hawkeye swallows. “I could--.”

“Not a chance. I told you before. No more running. No leaving. We’re all stuck, now, for better or worse. If you leave, he’ll go after you. I’ll lose you both. And as hurt as I am, as mad as I feel, that would be the worst possible thing. I can’t--.”

“No one is leaving you,” Hawkeye reminds her. “I just meant that I could give you some space, today. BJ won’t be back for hours, and I could go keep myself busy in the lobby or something until you’re feeling better.”

“And leave you alone with the bar? Not likely.”

“I wouldn’t--.”

“I won’t risk it. You said it’s situational. Well, here’s a situation if ever there was one. Even _I_ want to get blind drunk, right now.”

“Sorry I can’t help with that.”

“No. It’s better for us both that we stay sober. We’re not done talking this through.”

Hawkeye’s shoulders drop in sad defeat. “We’re not? Damn.”

Peg gets to her feet and pulls Hawkeye up, too. “We’re not. But we can at least be comfortable while we do it. Get out of those wet things. You’re going to catch pneumonia, and if you nearly die again BJ will probably immediately have sex with you, and I just can’t handle that right now.”

Hawkeye stares at her, clearly at a loss as to whether or not she’s joking. 

She huffs in exasperation and pushes him gently toward the bathroom door, throwing his pajamas after him. “Go, go. Change your clothes. Freshen up. Maybe take a hot shower, just in case.”

\--

Peg ties the belt of her robe more securely and perches on the edge of the hotel bed. From the sounds of things, Hawkeye has decided to take her up on the suggestion of a warm shower. She’s glad. It gives her the alone time she needs without the concern of what trouble Hawkeye might get into while out of her sight.

She’s never felt so tired in her life, but she doesn’t need or want to sleep. 

_I knew it was something_ , she tells herself, which is true. She’d seen the Elephant hovering around BJ from the moment that first letter to Maine had bounced back. She just hadn’t had enough of the trees together for which to see the forest. She hadn’t known that BJ’s interests...well, why would she? Such things weren’t topics of conversation among most civilized people, were they? She had never told him of her own experimental exploits in college, after all. It was too scandalous. Immoral, perhaps, though Peg herself has doubts about that. She had enjoyed her college experiences, by and large. But she hadn’t felt the need to explore much past those secret hours. Peg liked men. More importantly, she liked BJ. She’d met him right after graduation, and she’s never so much as looked at another person since. 

_Until lately,_ Peg’s treacherous brain supplies. She doesn’t want to think about that element, yet. It is too much to contemplate. Is it common, this kind of shared and consensual infidelity among multiple adults? She doesn’t know. Even the books she’s read have never broached the subject.

_I’m probably not reading the right books_. Peg resolves to fix that, first and foremost. 

Peg wonders what BJ will think, what he’ll say or do. That’s the next step, she knows. She and Hawkeye need to decide their approach. In the moment, Peg prefers the idea of not mentioning any of it to BJ at all. Unfortunately, to pick that option paints her a hypocrite. She would have wanted to know the truth about the affair. BJ will want to know the truth, now, too. He deserves to know that his secret has been found out and how she feels about it. 

Peg falls back on the bed, making it bounce. To think, just a few days ago, this trip to Chicago had seemed so very simple. Her good intentions for a second honeymoon with her loving husband have been twisted all up like a pretzel. The Hawkeye Effect in action, Peg figures. Chaotic, if well meaning.

Hawkeye pads out of the bathroom in his borrowed pajamas with still-damp hair and a hangdog expression. Peg hates that face, so vulnerable and self-conscious. Hawkeye had been so happy that morning, and he had sacrificed all of that easy contentment to tell her the truth. 

Peg pats the empty expanse of bed next to her and is vaguely disappointed when Hawkeye elects to sit on the overstuffed chair, instead. 

“We have to tell BJ that I know, I think,” Peg says.

Hawkeye nods. Peg suspects he knew this was coming.

“Sooner rather than later.”

Hawkeye nods again.

“Are you really not going to say anything?”

“I don’t know what to say. I’m not often speechless, Peggy, but this’ll do the trick. He’s going to be cheesed off that I blabbed, you realize. He might decide he doesn’t want to see me, again.”

“Too bad for him if he does,” Peg says, stubbornly. “I wouldn’t let him do that to you twice.”

Hawkeye’s smile is wry. “You really mean that.”

“Of course I do. I keep telling you. I just want everyone to be happy. I want _you_ to be happy, Hawkeye. You’re a good man.”

Hawkeye quirks a brow at her, disbelieving. “I’m the Other Woman.”

Peg shrugs. “I’m sure a lot of the Other Women out there are also good people. I don’t see that it’s mutually exclusive at all.”

“BJ didn’t oversell your virtues. You really are some kind of saint.”

Peg wrinkles her nose. “I wish I was. Don’t mistake me, Hawkeye. I’m disappointed. I’m angry. I’m feeling very misused and selfish, right now. I’m just as human as the next person, and my heart has taken a hit. I just also happen to be too stubborn to let go of what is mine. BJ is mine.”

Hawkeye sits up, leans toward her, practically brimming over with earnestness. “Peg, I know--.”

“And so are you, now.”

Hawkeye slumps back, mouth lax, all the wind gone from his sails. Stunned. “Huh. ...Oh.”

“I’m not a good Quaker girl, Hawkeye. I don’t believe in irredeemable souls. Life is not that black and white. There is no ultimate good or bad. I don’t even know that I believe in the concept of sin at all. There are just people, doing their best. You did your best by my husband for nearly three years. I appreciate that. We’re still friends, as far as I’m concerned. I need you to listen and believe me when I say that.”

Hawkeye nods very slowly, holding up his hands in self-defense. “All right. I believe you.”

“Good. Now help me prepare my speech. I’m too nervous to talk to BJ about this off the cuff.”

\--

Peg’s carefully constructed words turn to ash in her mouth the minute BJ walks through the door. His smile is so open, so equally warm for each of them, that she can’t bring herself to ruin the moment.

“I’ve come to whisk you both away for dinner,” BJ declares. “Anywhere in town. It’s our last night in the Windy City, and sky’s the limit.”

“I’d kill someone for a lobster swimming in butter,” Hawkeye says, when the silence draws on too long. 

Peg forces a smile. “Why stop at one? Get three.”

BJ laughs. “What about you, Peggy? What are you craving?”

She loves Chinese takeout and ice cream so melted it turns into sweet, frothy soup. She shrugs. “Oh, I’m not really that hungry. Maybe I’ll steal some off Hawkeye’s plate.”

“Be wary,” Hawkeye replies with the airy tone of one of his jokes with too much truth behind them, “The last time someone tried to steal from my plate, I bit into them, instead.”

Peg looks, wide-eyed, to BJ for confirmation. BJ, however, looks just as shocked. Not a Korea story, then, or a childhood tale he would have already shared. Something from later. Peg puts a stranglehold on her sympathy. Not right now. 

“Duly noted. I’ll order a small plate of my own, instead. Let me get ready, BJ. My hair’s a mess.”

“Looks all right to me,” both BJ and Hawkeye say in unison. Peggy looks from one to the other of them and throws up her hands in despair. 

“It’s still wet from the shower! I haven’t so much as _brushed_ it. Men! Honestly.”

\--

Dinner is difficult. 

Hawkeye and BJ manage to carry on a conversation (more of a communal banter, really), for which Peg is grateful. She couldn’t possibly hope to fill any awkward silences herself in such a state. 

She pushes the contents of her plate around and around the ceramic until her pasta goes limp and the tomato sauce separates, bleeding faintly orange liquid from the chunky tomato bits. It looks decidedly unappetizing. 

“Peg?” 

BJ is watching her, a slight frown pulling at his brows. “Is the pasta not good? You can order something else.”

“Oh, it’s fine. I’m really not terribly hungry.”

“I’ll eat it if you won’t,” Hawkeye offers, reaching for her plate. Peg surrenders it, accepting his own in its place. He’s practically licked it clean. She doesn’t know how he can stand eating at such a time as this. She can only surmise it’s down to his survival reflex. He has taught himself food must be eaten when it is available, no matter how one feels about eating at the time. 

She shouldn’t have let them go to dinner before talking to BJ.

After dinner, BJ excuses himself to use the restroom. Hawkeye watches him go and then leans forward, taking Peg’s hands in his under the table. “Hey. You going to make it? You’re white as a sheet.”

“I can’t,” Peg whispers back. “What if he gets angry?”

“You said you wouldn’t let him stop talking to me. I figured you had a plan.”

“Not angry at _you_. Angry at me.”

“Why would he--?”

“I don’t know! I don’t know. I don’t want to upset anything. We’re doing so well. He’s so happy.”

“He’ll be happier without this hanging over his head. You know it.”

Peg groans. “I hate confrontation. It used to drive our marriage counselor up the walls. He kept setting up these scenarios for us. You’re supposed to use ‘I’ words and talk about your feelings to work through the conflict. But I couldn’t do it! I wouldn’t acknowledge the problems at all. BJ would say ‘Honey, I feel like you aren’t respecting my feelings about the new carpet’ and I would say ‘You are so right, I’m so sorry, I’ll never make changes to the house without your input again.’”

“That...seems pretty healthy, to me.”

“Except I was always _lying_. It made me _mad_ that he was upset about the carpet! It was my carpet, not his. He wasn’t even around! What was I supposed to do, mail him the swatches? Spend three months sending a few letters back and forth about it before making the order? I was just as annoyed as him about it! But I didn’t want to fight!”

Hawkeye bites his lip. He’s trying not to laugh at her, she can tell. He gives her fingers a squeeze. “I assume you worked past it.”

“Yes. The counselor threatened to remove himself from our case if I didn’t fess up. And once I started, I couldn’t stop. We had a whole two hour session of it, just me sitting on that couch and giving BJ the business. Everything kept piling on and on. BJ thought it was hysterical. He heard me out on the few couple of points but then he started laughing and laughing, and he couldn’t stop laughing any more than I could stop yelling at him. That was our last day of therapy. I think the counselor gave us a clean bill of health just to get rid of us both.”

Hawkeye is _definitely_ struggling not to giggle, now. “I...Peg. You should talk to him about it. You’re both going to be fine. I’ll be here for you. Or not. Whatever you want.”

BJ sits down at the table. Hawkeye slowly lets go of Peg’s hands and sits back in his chair. “Talking about baseball, huh?” BJ says, archly. 

Peg swallows. “Darling, can we get the check? I--I’d like to go back to the room, now.”

BJ’s suspicious expression melts into one of concern. “Are you feeling all right?” 

“I’m fine. I just--I need--we need to talk to you.”

BJ looks at Hawkeye. “Always an ominous phrase.”

“Trust your instincts,” Hawkeye advises. This does not put BJ at ease. 

\-- 

Peg paces. BJ and Hawkeye watch her go. 

“Did something happen today?” BJ asks. He directs the question to Hawkeye, not Peg.

“Yes,” Hawkeye says, and he leaves it at that. At BJ’s irritated look, he shrugs apologetically. But he doesn’t budge. He just watches Peg go, back and forth, back and forth. 

Peg turns on her heel and crosses the long side of the bed once more. 

“I’m getting dizzy,” Hawkeye announces. “I’ve never been seasick on land before. Let me know if you see a white whale go by. I’ve been looking for one of those.”

“Peggy, maybe if you start at the beginning--.” BJ suggests. Peg whirls on him. Her hands find her hips and she leans forward. With both the men sitting down on the low bed, she very nearly looms. “The beginning, BJ? Well, from what I’ve been _told_ , that wasn’t anything worth worrying about. Just some ‘brotherly affection.’”

Hawkeye blinks. “I thought you were going to come at this rationally.”

Peg turns her glare on him. “I was. Then I got mad, all the sudden. So we’re doing it like this, instead.”

“So much for a fear of conflict,” Hawkeye mutters, running his hands over his face. 

“I don’t understand what’s going on,” BJ says, speaking slowly.

“Good!” Peg shouts at him. “Neither do I!”

“...Ok.” BJ looks to Hawkeye for help. Hawkeye shakes his head. No help, here. Nobody here but us chickens. 

“Stop looking at him!” Peg says, throwing up her arms in dismay. “You’re like two schoolboys in trouble, trying to cheat off each other for the right answer.”

“I _feel_ like a schoolboy in trouble,” BJ rejoins. “I wish you’d tell me what I did wrong so I can try and fix it.”

“You _know_ ,” Peg says, and all remaining shreds of her composure unravel. She’s going to cry again, at this rate. Certainly her eyes are burning. 

Realization dawns across BJ’s face, terrible to behold. Watching it happen makes Hawkeye so uncomfortable that he looks away, staring down at the floor as if engrossed in the pattern of the well-trodden carpet. 

“Peg,” BJ whispers, voice soft and cracking. “Oh, Peg.” BJ stares at Hawkeye again, not seeking answers now. His eyes are full of accusation, piercing daggers of blame. 

Peg steps to BJ and grabs his chin in her hands, forcing him to look at her. “Not at him. Look at me. Look at _me_ , BJ, I’m the one who needs your eyes, right now.”

BJ’s anguish bleeds out of him so clearly that Peg is almost afraid it will touch her, seep into her, and compound on her own terrible pain. 

“Shit,” BJ whispers, voice cracking. “I don’t--I don’t know what to say.”

Peg shoos him over. She sits in the narrow space between the two men and joins one of them in staring at the floor. “I don’t know, either. I had a whole speech rehearsed. I don’t remember it, now.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“I know you are.”

“It didn’t mean anyt--.”

“ _Don’t_!” Hawkeye cries, the shout torn from his throat. He still keeps his eyes on the ground, but his hands clench desperately into the edge of the bed, his whole body set rigidly against the terrible words about to leave BJ’s lips. BJ stares at him around his wife’s shoulder, expression stricken. Hawkeye’s voice trembles. “Jesus, Beej. Please don’t.”

“Hawk, I’m--.”

“Just don’t say it,” Hawkeye begs, voice weak. 

Peg puts a hand between Hawkeye’s shoulder blades. His back is so tense she half expects him to spring away at the slightest touch. He doesn’t. He leans back against her hand and takes a deep breath and then another. Slowly, as if fighting the very air around them, he turns and pulls his gaze back to the two of them. 

“It meant something,” Hawkeye says, enunciating each syllable with great care. “If it didn’t mean anything, that makes it even worse for her, don’t you get it, you _numbskull_?”

“And for him, too,” Peg adds, sadly. “Hawkeye, it makes it worse for you, too.”

Hawkeye offers a wry look. “I’m not the one we’re supposed to be worrying about right now. Did you forget?”

Peg groans in frustration. Gracelessly, she leans to the side and flops against Hawkeye, her head resting on the round of his shoulder, her hand fisting in the fabric of his shirt. “I’m always worrying about you. Both of you,” she tells the air.

BJ puts a hand on her back, just the lightest, most hesitant touch. “I feel like I’m missing something,” he says. 

“Don’t we all,” Hawkeye sighs. He looks over Peg’s head at BJ. “Beej, I’m sorry I spilled our collective beans. I just--I couldn’t keep on lying like we were. Not all the way to California. Not in your house. Not around your _child_.”

“I know. I wanted--I thought I’d try to--. Well, I’m glad you did it so I didn’t have to.” BJ tugs gently at Peg’s shoulder. “We can go back to therapy. We’ll make it work.”

Peg follows the pull of his hand and turns her attention to her husband. She misses the warm, safe darkness of the crook of Hawkeye’s neck. But the warm safety of BJ’s eyes is just as good. “If you like. I’m sure it would be useful, anyway. But what about Hawkeye?”

BJ winces. He doesn’t look at Hawkeye, this time. He gazes in any direction BUT the one in which Hawkeye sits, in fact. “I--that was...it was a long time ago. In a whole different world.”

Hawkeye snorts softly. “Literally,” he mutters. 

“BJ Hunnicutt!” Peg scolds. “That’s it?”

“We had...we both understood! We had an understanding. It’s you I’m not understanding right now, Peg. What do you want me to do? Do you _want_ me to--to--carry on having an affair?”

Peg grimaces with distaste at the word. “No,” she admits, softly. 

“Hawkeye, tell her we both understood that it was going to end. That you’re not--.”

“I can’t,” Hawkeye sighs. He rubs a hand over his eyes, blocking out the light, the room, the whole conversation. “BJ, I can’t tell her that because I _am_. I am upset. I do miss you. I-I-I’d do anything to just be able to go back to what we were! Hell, I’d go back to Korea! I’d _rot_ in that fucking hellhole, Beej, as long as you were there rotting along with me.”

BJ stares at him with wide eyes, his mouth slightly agape. He swallows hard and licks his lips a few times as if his mouth has gone dry. “Hawk. Hawk, I don’t feel the same way. I wouldn’t go back. Not for anything. I...I want my life. My kid. My wife. Our little house in our little town, I _want_ that. I wouldn’t trade Korea for...I couldn’t go back there. Not even for you.”

“I know.” Hawkeye offers his best friend a pained smile. “I’ve always known where you stood and where I stood. I know that I’m more...invested. I _understand_ our understanding, BJ. I just don’t--it’s not good enough for me, now.”

“I love Peg,” BJ says, sparing her a glance. 

“I know,” Hawkeye repeats. The two men lock eyes and stare at each other in silence, unspoken words passing between them with the ease of long practice. The air between them is practically electric. Peg knows because she’s sitting in it. She feels lightheaded. 

“I need to lie down,” she announces, and proceeds to flop backward onto the bed. Both men make soft sounds of surprise. Two pairs of warm hands find either of her shoulders, gripping close.

“You all right?” Hawkeye asks, even as BJ says “Something wrong?”

Peg sighs up at them. “Overwhelmed, I think. Don’t mind me.”

Hawkeye hums in agreement. “I know the feeling. Maybe we should agree to table this discussion for another time.”

“Can we?” BJ asks, seriously. “Hawk, can you get on that plane with us tomorrow morning without this being resolved?”

Hawkeye closes his eyes and breathes in slowly through his nose. Another calming breathing technique. Peg is getting wise to his little tics. When Hawkeye opens his eyes again, they are without either sparkle or censure. “Yeah, Beej. Whatever we discuss won’t make a difference in that regard. Peg wants me to come with you. So I’m coming with you. End of story.”

Peg holds onto that promise all of the long, restless night that follows. With things as they are, they decide that Peg and BJ ought to share the bed. Hawkeye takes to the cot with only a few flat jokes about nostalgia factor--though, he says, at least the cot is slate gray and not olive green. 

There are no nightmares to worry about that night--no one can suffer bad dreams while wide awake. 

\--

There’s turbulence on the first flight. Hawkeye sits across the aisle, his fingers digging hard into the armrests. He keeps muttering under his breath. At first, Peg had suspected him of praying. Now, she recognizes the repeated syllables as a sentence including a semi-familiar name. ‘Not like Heny, not like Henry.’

Peg looks over at BJ, intent on sending him over to help his friend. BJ snores loudly, dead to the world thanks to the provided ear plugs and sleep mask. Peg clucks her tongue at him in disapproval. True, none of them had gotten the best sleep last night, but he might have made a token effort to stay awake out of a sense of camaraderie with the rest of them. 

Peg checks that she’s clear to stand on the plane and crouches awkwardly in the wide aisle. She rests her hand on Hawkeye’s arm. “Hey, sweetie. You’re making the nice young lady next to you very nervous.”

The dark-skinned woman in question casts Peg a grateful look. She does, indeed, look pretty spooked by Hawkeye’s tight-eyed, clenched fist muttering. 

Hawkeye opens his eyes, the words going still on his lips even as the plane hits another air pocket and the whole machine gives a rough jostle. Peg uses her hold on Hawkeye to keep herself upright. “We’re going to die,” Hawkeye says, rather matter-of-factly.

Peg’s eyebrows lift in surprise. “Oh?” 

“I don’t know if you know this, but human beings aren’t meant to fly. And big, giant pieces of metal aren’t, either.”

“BJ never mentioned you had a fear of flying.”

“I don’t. I’m claustrophobic, and I’m afraid of drowning. I don’t mind flying a bit. Flying is a piece of cake.”

Peg looks pointedly at his clenched fist. “Oh?”

Hawkeye swallows hard and corrects himself. “I didn’t _used_ to be afraid of flying. I got back to Maine _fine_ , although, admittedly, I took a couple of tranquilizers beforehand.”

Peg closes her eyes and prays for patience. “Hawkeye, you should have told BJ and I about this earlier. He could have made sure you were comfortable.”

“I forgot to mention it. I’ve been trying not to think about it at all.”

“When did this phobia start?”

“Henry,” Hawkeye says without hesitation. “Did you know he was going home when his chopper got hit? It spun in. Everyone on board died.”

“There’s no enemy fire here, Hawkeye. The plane is perfectly safe,” Peg assures.

“Yeah. I know. I know. It’s just--.” The plane jumps. There’s no other way to describe it. Peg feels her stomach leap to her throat and fall back down again, just as if she were on a rollercoaster. 

“Excuse me,” Peg says to the woman (who is looking alarmed, still, but for entirely different reasons, now). “Would you mind terribly trading me seats? That’s my husband back there. He’s very nice. And also asleep right now, so he’ll be no trouble. I need to talk to my friend. While belted in.”

The woman casts a dubious glance across the way, clearly not thrilled to be up and about while the plane is rocking. “Ok,” she agrees, finally, “but you gotta get this man to stop saying these things. _I’m_ going to get a phobia, next.”

“Understandable. So sorry. Thank you so much.” 

The two women swap seats with only a little trouble (Peg gets caught on Hawkeye’s knees for a moment before he has the presence of mind to pull his legs up). Peg breathes a sigh of relief as she falls into her borrowed seat, closing her belt with a satisfying click. 

“Nothing to worry about, huh?” Hawkeye presses, watching her like, well, a hawk. 

Peg sticks out her tongue at him. “You know what I meant.”

The plane jostles and Hawkeye groans, throwing his head back against the seat, the picture of aggravated distress. “Talk to me,” he begs, “I don’t care about what. Your favorite brand of cereal, why the sky is blue, anything.”

Peg snorts. “I don’t like cereal. I don’t know _why_ the sky is blue.” She pauses, considering. “Do you want to know how all of your friends from the M.A.S.H are doing? BJ has kept in touch with quite a few. Even I send them letters, sometimes. Father Mulcahy is especially lovely. My mother doesn’t approve of my Catholic penpal, I think. But that just makes it even more fun.”

Hawkeye’s smile, though shaky, is genuine. “I’d like that very much. Go ahead and start with the good reverend. How is he?”

“Good. You know, he had it rough just after the war ended. He risked his life to save a group of prisoners of war and got caught in the middle, you might remember. Well, the mortar blew out his eardrums. He lost most of his hearing.”

“What?” Hawkeye exclaims, shocked. 

“Mhm. BJ promised not to tell. It’s all right now, though. He’s rallied well. The hearing aids are doing wonders for him, and the last I heard from him he’d returned to the states to teach boxing at a Catholic institution for the deaf.” 

“That’s...I had no idea. Poor Mulcahy.”

“It was a difficult transition for him. We talked about it a lot in our letters. Honestly, he’s doing much better now. He’s excited by the new opportunity, I think. You know how the religious are, Hawkeye. He’s gratified to have been given a new purpose by his God, even if it came upon him in a traumatic way.”

Hawkeye rubs his knuckles against the bridge of his nose. “No one gets out of war in one piece, do they?”

“No,” Peg agrees, softly. “Do you want to hear about the others?”

“I don’t know, Peg, was anyone else I care about maimed without my knowledge?”

She gives him a look. 

He waves a hand. “All right. Sure. Go for it.” The plane gives a soft rattle. He squirms uncomfortably but nothing more. 

“Klinger and his wife are in Korea. Still looking for her family, I’m afraid. They’re happy, though. They have a new baby. She’s, gosh, nearly six months old, by now. He promised to send pictures next time. Apparently he and Soon-Lee have matching _chimas_ that they want to show off.”

Hawkeye grins. “That’s great.”

“Radar stops by the house every three or four months, if he can. He sold the farm not too long ago--it was just in too dire of straits to save. He’s at the police academy, now, if you can believe that.”

“As long as his future career involves saving cats from trees and eating his weight in donuts, I do.” Hawkeye pauses, perhaps realizing this is uncharitable of him. “Radar’s a good kid. He’ll make a great cop.”

“I’m afraid that’s all I know, really. Colonel Potter sends BJ and me the odd holiday card, but there isn’t much in them. They used to talk on the phone all the time, but that was...well, that was early on, when everyone was looking for you. There were a lot of long phone calls, in those days.” Peg smiles suddenly. “I can’t wait to get the news around. They’ll all be thrilled.” 

Hawkeye grimaces. “I’m not too sure about that.”

Peg pokes his arm. “I saw how they were when you were AWOL, honey. Believe me. They’ll be over the moon. BJ and I will probably have to host a big, international party for you.”

“Well, every party needs a party pooper, so I’ll be sure to attend,” Hawkeye drawls. 

“I thought you used to pollinate with the best of them, Mr. Social Butterfly.”

“Actually, that was my name before the divorce. Hawkeye Pierce _nee_ Butterfly, that’s me.”

Peg bites her lip. “Do you not want me to tell the others where you are?”

Hawkeye runs a hand through his hair. Peg resists the urge to finger-comb it back into place afterward. The well-pomaded strands stick up every which way once he’s done with them. “No, no. There’s enough lying by omission going around for everyone. By all means, sound the alarm. Let them know the prodigal son has returned.”

“I don’t know where I’ll find a fatted calf at this late hour, but I’ll do my best.”

Hawkeye grins at her and then blinks, looking around the cabin in shock. “Hey. The turbulence stopped.”

Peg smiles at him smugly. “Imagine that.” She unbuckles her belt and goes to stand. “I should get back to my seat.”

Hawkeye puts a hand on her arm. His fingers are warm. “Stay. BJ is asleep, anyway, and honestly I think our young lady friend is much happier sitting there than next to me.” 

Peg leans forward and peeks over the aisle. Sure enough, BJ snores blissfully on and the woman looks relaxed and content, her nose now stuck in a book. “All right. But you have to promise not to nap. It won’t be fair if everyone gets to California well rested but me.”

“Why, can’t you sleep?”

“Not while on an _airplane_. Don’t you know how dangerous these things are? What if we crash?”

Hawkeye laughs. 

\--

Peg places her suitcase in the trunk of the car and marvels at how strange and surreal it all feels, as if they’ve been away for years and not just an extended weekend. In just a little while they’ll be pulling into their driveway in Mill Valley. Erin and Peg’s parents will be waiting there, probably with glasses of cold lemonade and giant pieces of her mother’s famous peach spice cake. 

A typical reunion made atypical, she’s sure, by the presence of the tall, silent shadow looming behind BJ’s shoulder.

“You’re being very quiet, Hawkeye,” Peg says after they’ve been driving for a few minutes, twisting a bit in the passenger seat to get a better eye on the man sprawled out in the back. 

“I think he’s sleeping,” BJ replies, in a softer voice. Peg squints a bit and confirms it’s true by the slow rise and fall of Hawkeye’s chest. 

“Hmph. He promised not to nap. Now everyone will be bright-eyed and bushy tailed except--” she interrupts herself with a loud yawn “--me.”

“I forgot you don’t sleep well while traveling. Sorry, darling.”

Peg rolls down her window a smidge, hoping some fresh air will keep her alert. “It’s not your fault. I don’t think any one of us slept a wink last night.”

BJ casts a glance her way. “Peg--.”

“I really don’t want to talk about it, if that’s all right. I don’t think either of us have anything new or useful to say.”

“You just think it’ll become a fight, and you don’t want to argue.”

Peg curses to herself silently. Her husband knows her too well. She casts her mind back to their therapy sessions and resolves to use all her best ‘I’ phrases. “I’m not angry about the--” she pauses, loath to use _that word_ “--it’s not that you and Hawkeye were...together. I might not have been able to understand at the time it was happening, but I do _now_. I understand that you were both lonely and hurting and you needed each other. I’m upset that you lied to me about it, BJ. I’m upset that after everything we’ve been through together, you didn’t trust me enough to fess up.”

“I saw so many good men lose their marriages over there, Peg. I didn’t...I didn’t want to be one of them. That decision was selfish. I’m sorry.”

Peg shrugs. “I can’t tell you I forgive you. I don’t.”

“All right.”

“But Hawkeye--.”

BJ shocks her by slamming his hand suddenly against the steering wheel. “God _damn_ it, Peg, can you stop talking about Hawkeye for one second? This is about us! You and me!”

Peg stares at him, more stunned than truly alarmed. She’s not a stranger to BJ’s temper. He gets wound up from time to time and expresses anger just like anyone else. But the sheer vehemence of this outburst and the trigger for it surprises her right down to her bones. “Pull over,” she orders.

“What?” 

“Pull over. I’ve seen you drive angry before, BJ. It’s very dangerous.” She prefers it when they can duke it out in the wide, open expanse of the kitchen with baked goods and warm drinks just a compromise away--but the side of the road will have to do, this time. 

BJ sighs and obligingly crosses over to park on the shoulder. He unclips his belt and leaves the car, careful not to slam the door and wake Hawkeye up. Peg does the same. The two of them walk a few steps down into the ditch. 

“First of all, don’t you _dare_ tell me to keep Hawkeye out of this, BJ,” Peg says. “You might recall, you’re the one who brought him _into_ it in the first place.”

“I keep telling you, what happened between us, it’s in the past, it doesn’t--.”

“ _Don’t_.” Peg steps up against him, tilting her head back to meet his gaze with her own. “BJ, you have to stop saying that. Stop _thinking_ it. Every time you do, it breaks his heart. I know you want to be loyal to me, now, and pretending none of it happened is your way of moving forward. But it’s another lie. It’s a terrible untruth, the kind that destroys people.”

“I love _you_ ,” BJ insists.

“That’s very nice! I love you, too, you big idiot. That has nothing to do with Hawkeye!”

“Of course it doesn’t. That’s what I’ve been saying! What does Hawkeye have to do with you and me? With _us_?”

Peg reaches forward and taps a small fist against his chest in frustration, as if knocking to be let in. “It’s not me versus Hawkeye. You think it is, and that’s why you’re doing this. You think you have to pick me--.”

“I _want_ to pick you!”

“It doesn’t matter! I’m flattered. I appreciate it. But that’s not the point. You’re hurting him! You have us labeled in boxes. Hawkeye, Choice A; Peg, Choice B. Either way, someone gets left out in the cold. And you can’t _do_ that to him, BJ. He needs someone. He needs _you_ , specifically.”

BJ fists his hands in his hair in equal irritation. It’s more fine than Hawkeye’s and doesn’t stand up as wildly as his had under similar treatment. Peg still can’t quite help but to reach up and pat the disarray back down again. She gives his head an extra pat or two for measure, after. “Maybe I don’t want that kind of responsibility,” BJ whines, like a big child. 

Peg rolls her eyes at him. “Too bad. You already have it. You gave a piece of yourself to him in Korea, and he gave you a piece of himself right back. There are no refunds or returns for that sort of exchange. These are the consequences of your actions. Are you really just going to tear him out of you and leave him to die?”

“That’s--Jesus, Peg, that’s pretty melodramatic, don’t you think?”

Peg shrugs. “Comes from reading so many classics at a formative age, maybe. Just because I’m waxing poetic doesn’t mean I’m not right.”

BJ slowly runs his hands over his face, breathing out a loud sigh. “What am I supposed to do, then?”

“I don’t know. I just know that what you’re doing right now isn’t it. Stop pretending he doesn’t matter to you just as much as I do. It does all of us a disservice.”

BJ goes to her, finally, and pulls her into a hard, desperate hug. She relaxes into it immediately. “I love him,” he whispers into her hair, soft and choked with shame. It’s not great, the shame--but what he says is true, and he’s said it, and that’s a start. 

“I know, darling. I know you do. You need to tell him so, too.”

“But I--.”

“It’s not me versus him,” she reminds him, gently. “I don’t mind. I won’t be hurt. Please, BJ. He’s afraid to lean on you because he thinks you hate him, so he’s been leaning entirely on me this whole time, because he knows I _don’t_ hate him--even if he’s shocked by that fact. And, honestly, honey, I’m so tired. I need you to help me.”

BJ closes his eyes. “I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t even notice. I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right. You know, now. Just, please, do something about it.”

The back door opens. Hawkeye’s head pokes up. “Hey, driver, did you forget to take a left at Albuquerque? What’s going on?”

“Impromptu marriage counseling,” Peg tells him, brightly. “Don’t worry about it. Go back to sleep.”

Hawkeye’s expression goes from confused to deeply troubled. “Are you sure?”

“Just give us a second, Hawk,” BJ says. Then, after a pause. “I’ll be right there to tuck you in.”

Hawkeye stares at him in bafflement for a few long seconds. Then he grins, jumping into the old, familiar banter with obvious glee. “Well don’t keep me waiting, doctor. You know, I’m still waiting for the ending bit of that story about the old Greek and the lions.”

\--

The rest of the drive to Mill Valley feels markedly different. BJ and Hawkeye’s banter--previously stilted, smothered by the unacknowledged Elephant--takes on a warmer, faster pace. Peg hops in with a quip of her own from time to time, but mostly she remains content to sit back and listen, letting the two warm voices wash over her. 

All three are laughing by the time they pull back into the old homestead and exit the car.

“Mommy!” Erin’s voice cries out. Peg has only a second to brace herself before a small, blond cannonball throws itself into her arms. 

“My baby!” Peg cries back, giving her daughter a thorough snuggling. “Oh, you’ve gotten so big!”

“Have I?”

“Yes, my darling. You’ve grown six inches at least! What has Grammy been feeding you?” 

Erin pauses. Ah, here comes a fib. “Lotsa vegetables,” she says.

Peg laughs. “BJ, come take your child away from me. She has grown too big, and I can’t possibly hold her any more.”

“Daddy!” Erin squeals. BJ takes her into his arms and swings her around, extending his arms high into the air so that she seems to fly. Erin hollars with delight. “Daddy, Daddy, go _faster_!” 

“Oh, don’t. She’ll get sick.”

“Not that one,” a voice says from the open front door. “Got a stomach of iron, she does. Just like her granddaddy. And her mother.”

“Dad!” Peg greets, going to give her father a hug. “Where’s mom?”

“Kitchen. Putting the glaze on her spice cake.”

Peg smiles. Her parents are anything if not predictable.

Speaking of their predictability… “Who’s that?”

Erin stops screeching as BJ promptly puts her back on her feet. All eyes go to Hawkeye. Hawkeye, who has two of the smaller suitcases in his hands. Hawkeye, who looks travel creased and sleep-deprived and pale. He’d shaved that morning--Peg knows, she’d helped him do it--but a shadow of stubble clings determinedly to his cheeks all the same. He looks unwell, unsavory, ...unsuitable. 

Peg’s father gives a soft, unimpressed grunt. Peg briefly closes her eyes and prepares herself for a battle she isn’t sure she can win. _Quakers_ , she reminds herself _are supposed to be welcoming of all kinds_. Quakers, yes. Her parents...she’s not sure. Certainly they’d taken their sweet time in warming up to BJ, at first.

“Pa, this is Hawkeye--,” Peg beings. BJ surprises her by interrupting.

“--He’s a buddy of mine from Korea, Floyd. My best friend, in fact, and a damn good surgeon.”

“Why’s he here?” Floyd questions, not without suspicion. 

“Oh, well, it turns out that Hawkeye has been living in Chicago. We met up and got to talking and decided it’d be lovely if he could come and stay with us for a while,” Peg says, with forced cheer.

Hawkeye shifts his weight from foot to foot and offers her father a friendly nod. She hates it when he’s left speechless.

“Well, let’s not just stand out here,” BJ says. He grabs up the largest of the suitcases and starts to not-so-subtly shepherd everyone inside. Erin leaves his side and toddles curiously over to Hawkeye. Hawkeye immediately drops the bags in his hands and crouches down to be at her eye level. “Hello, Erin. I’ve heard a lot about you.”

Erin considers him for a moment. “I like your hat. Can I wear it?”

Hawkeye grins and plucks the gray velvet off his head, dropping it over Erin’s own. The hat sinks low over her ears, obscuring her blue eyes from sight. “That’s a good look for you. Very chic.”

“Erin, why don’t you take Uncle Hawkeye there and go show him your toys?” BJ suggests. 

“Oh, I can help with the--,” Hawkeye protests. 

Erin grabs Hawkeye’s hand and pulls. “Come see my toys, Uncle Hawk! I have so many good ones. My favorite is my truck. Do you want to see my truck?”

“With all my heart,” Hawkeye quips dryly, though there’s no malice behind it. He gets to his feet and allows himself to be pulled along by the small girl. “I guess I’ll see you all in a few hours,” he says as he disappears inside. 

Peg and BJ exchange smiles and split the suitcases up between them. 

It’s nice, she must admit, to come home after a long trip to fresh coffee and still-warm cake. It’s unfortunate that her parents are so ruffled about the appearance of BJ’s old friend, but they’ll warm up in time. They’d practically adopted Radar after a only few days. She knows it will all turn out all right, but in the moment she can’t help but see her parents’ reluctance as an omen, a foretelling of other, similar reactions to come. _One step at a time,_ she reminds herself. _Don’t go borrowing trouble._

Still, to put her mind at ease, she starts to put together a fresh to-do list. They’ll have to get Hawkeye a proper wardrobe, for example, more than just one gray suit. They need to reevaluate their grocery budget. Eventually, it will be necessary to find Hawkeye something with which to occupy his time. Something that doesn’t involve being left alone with Erin, at least not right away. She makes an additional mental note to ask BJ about that odd conversation at the tailor’s later. Oh, and of course they needed--.

“Peggy?” 

Peg blinks up at her mother. “Oh, I’m sorry, Mama. My mind was a thousand miles away. What did you say?”

“I asked if you had a good time in Chicago. You didn’t get lonely without BJ over there, did you?”

Peg smiles, thinking of shared meals and art museums and a long walk in the rain. “No, mom. It was fine. I kept myself entertained.”

\--

She calls Madeline that evening, after her parents have left and BJ goes off to put Erin to bed. Hawkeye already sprawls out on the guest bed, snores muffled in the overstuffed pillows. Peg pulls the phone wire out as far as she can and perches on the small back porch for a semblance of privacy.

“Hello?”

“Madeline! I hope I did the math right. It’s not too late there, is it?”

“Peggy Hunnicutt, my favorite Californian! You make it home all in one piece, kid?”

“You bet. All three of us arrived whole and mostly sane. If I never have to fly again, it will be too soon. Next time I come and visit, I think I’ll try and take a train.”

Madeline laughs. “Aw, you ought to be proud of yourself. You’re practically a world traveler. How’s little Erin doing? Bet she missed you.”

“She’s great. She hardly noticed we were gone, I think. Mom and Dad spoiled her rotten, though. It’ll be days before we can convince her that cake for breakfast is not an option.”

“Well, cakes do contain milk and eggs. Sounds pretty balanced, to me. How’s your shadow man doing?”

“Better, sometimes. And sometimes not. I don’t really know, right now. I think it’s a big adjustment, all of this. I keep telling myself to take it moment to moment. Otherwise, I’ll crack under the strain.”

Madeline is quiet for a while.

“Maddie? Did I lose you?”

“Listen, your husband is a good guy, right?”

Peg smiles. “He’s the best.”

“Then maybe it’s time you get him to shoulder his fair share. And don’t let that Hawkeye guy fool you, he could stand to take on some of his own problems himself, too. I know, I know, I’m mother-henning you, but, geez, Peggy. You don’t have to solve the world’s problems all on your lonesome, you know?”

“I know. I just...I just want everyone to be happy.”

“Well, are you happy?”

Peg gapes at the phone in stunned silence. “I...I don’t know. I haven’t been asked that in a while.”

“Exactly. Peggy. Put yourself first. You’re a firecracker of a lady, and I know you can take whatever life throws at you but, damn, do something for yourself for once, all right? Go to the library or whatever it is you do for fun.”

Peg chuckles. “I’ll think about it.”

“Don’t think. Go do, before you implode. I can’t talk to you on the phone if you’ve collapsed in on yourself like an old balloon.”

The imagery makes Peg giggle. “That’s a good pep talk. Thanks.” 

Peg can barely hear the sound of a cigarette being lit. “Gotta keep the morale up at the factory. I’ve gotten good at the old chestnuts. I mean it, though, Peg. Put Peg first. That should be your new motto.”

Peg smiles. “All right, all right. I get the idea. Enough about me, tell me about you. How’d your date go last night?”

Madeline sighs gustily into the phone, a faked simper of pure adoration. “Her lips, her eyes, her moans, her sighs. If I told you it all, you’d combust.” 

“Imploding, combusting--I’m just full of physically impossible surprises. I don’t need _all_ the details, thanks. But did you have fun?”

“Yeah, kid. I always have fun. Let me tell you about this funny thing that happened with her brother, though--.”

Peg leans back against the wall and allows herself the luxury of getting lost in Madeline’s wild story. It’s good to be home.

\--

Peg wakes up in the middle of the night and isn’t sure why. It’s dark and cool in their bedroom. The air tastes differently than that of the hotel room in Chicago--fresher, maybe. More brisk. She breathes in deeply, savoring it. 

Breath. That’s what woke her up. There’s her breathing, there’s BJ’s, and there’s…

“Erin, sweetie, don’t just hover. Get in.”

A pause. Then, softly. “Sorry, wrong errant child.” Hawkeye, sounding more shaken than he’d probably like. 

Peg scoots back into BJ’s side of the bed. His breath is warm on her shoulder. She throws back the corner of her side of the quilted coverlet. “Get in,” she repeats.

Hawkeye doesn’t argue or hesitate, sliding under the blankets with some difficulty. He’s ice cold to the touch, his skin damp and clammy. He trembles, a leaf in a storm. His breath comes in shallow, short gasps, as if he’s been running laps in more than just his dreams. Peg presses the flat of her palm against his racing heart. 

“It’s all right,” she murmurs. “Everything is ok. You’re here with us, and you’re safe.”

“Sorry,” he whispers back. “I--I wasn’t going to bother you. But I started to worry I’d wake up Erin if I kept...if I stayed in that room and kept trying not to scream.”

“It doesn’t matter. Everything is fine. You’re fine. Besides, Erin sleeps like--” she stops prudently before mentioning the dead “--like she’s under a wicked queen’s spell. You can’t bother her.”

Hawkeye’s breath hitches in his chest, a smothered sob. Peg can’t see his face, but she can picture it well enough, the twisted expression of a man struggling not to cry. 

“Hey, it’s ok,” Peg repeats. She tightens her hold on him, presses her face against his cheek. Impulsively, she kisses it. Hawkeye draws in a startled breath, but his shock is better than the shame-filled sobbing, she’s sure.

“Peg,” he says, uncertainly, but she shushes him. 

Madeline had advised her to act on her desires and enjoy herself. She kisses him again, just under his ear, this time. “Do you mind?” she asks, just in case. 

“No,” Hawkeye says. “Jesus. No, I don’t. But--.”

“Neither do I.”

“But Beej--.”

“Is awake,” Peg interrupts. “He doesn’t sleep like Erin. Do you, darling?”

BJ lets out the breath he’s been holding for the past few minutes, loud and gusty. “Should I turn on the light?” he asks, tone betraying nothing.

“I think so. Shield your eyes, Hawkeye.”

The light fills the room up in a warm, orange-y glow. The light seems to put Hawkeye more at ease, his shoulders dropping down from their hunch near his ears. Slowly, BJ pushes himself up into a sitting position, resting back against the headboard. He looks down at the other two, at his wife embracing his closest friend, her lips still whisker-close to his skin.

“We should talk,” BJ says. Peg smiles. _Finally_.

\--

They sit on the bed in a small huddle, a triangle with rounded corners and softened lines. BJ lets his head thunk back softly, repeatedly, against the headboard as if hoping to jar his thoughts to his lips. Hawkeye hunches over himself protectively, arms around his torso, shoulders up to his earlobes again; Peg thinks he looks like an agitated crow. Peg herself crosses her legs, straightens her back, and takes a deep breath.

“I want this to be an honest conversation, first of all. No holding back. That said, no one should feel pressured or--or obliged or anything else, either. If you think I’m crazy, just say so, and we won’t speak of it anymore.”

BJ lets his head drop back and fall still with a sigh. When he looks back up at his wife and friend, his expression is wry. “We can never do anything the easy way.”

“Speak for yourself,” Hawkeye jokes, “I’ve made a whole reputation on doing who’s easy.”

BJ raises his eyebrows.

“Reputation, I said,” Hawkeye argues. “I didn’t say it was true to life.”

“Boys,” Peg interrupts. “I won’t waste my breath in asking you to take this seriously, but if you could at least restrict yourselves to jokes that are actually funny….”

Hawkeye’s tense posture breaks, and he puts his hands to his chest in mock affront. “Peg! I’m wounded.”

“Yeah, your funny bone is broken,” BJ quips, brightly.

Peg sighs. “You’re stalling.”

Hawkeye pinches the bridge of his nose. “Of course we’re stalling. This conversation is terrifying, and you know it. You’re an absolute tyrant, Peg. I’ve been spilling the deepest secrets of my soul around you so much the past few days, I’m all hollowed out. My heart is going to droop in on itself like a flat balloon.”

The imagery is not so funny, this time. Peg scoots in a little so that she is closer to both Hawkeye and her husband. She takes BJ’s hand in one of hers and Hawkeye’s hand in the other. BJ and Hawkeye glance at each other, daring each other to close the circle between them and turn the situation into another jest.

“Stop it,” Peg orders. “Listen to me, please.”

Both men turn to look at her. She tries not to forget what she has to say under the weight of their combined gazes. Hawkeye is right, this is terrifying. She turns to BJ first. “I love you.” She shakes her head as he opens his mouth. “Don’t say it back. I know, thank you. I’m not done.”

BJ closes his mouth with a snap and tries to sneak a confused look Hawkeye’s way. Peg does not miss the exchange, but she doesn’t comment. Instead, she turns to Hawkeye. “I love you.”

Hawkeye tilts his head at her. “Peg,” he says, trying to laugh it off, “I don’t know what to say. This is all so sudden.” His hand has gone vice-tight around hers.

Peg, not to be deterred, nods. “I know it’s fast. And you don’t have to return the feeling. But it’s true all the same. I loved you when you were a story, a conquering hero who protected those in need and deflated the egos of the overbearing and cruel. I loved you when you were nothing but ink and paper. I loved you as my husband loved you, because I saw you how he saw you, and I heard your stories through his hands. And I love you now, what you really are or maybe just what you’ve become--our shadow. And I love you how you must have truly been long before I met you, too--an ordinary man struggling to survive in complicated times the only way you knew how.”

Hawkeye ducks his head, hiding his eyes. His lips fix themselves in a defensive, rictus grin. “Stop it, I’m blushing,” he mutters, but it’s a bad attempt at deflecting that falls immediately flat. In truth, his cheeks _are_ rather red.

Peg looks to her husband. “I love you. I love him. You’re not boxes. There is no Choice A, no Choice B. There’s just a venn diagram of my love, with you both in the middle of it. Do you see?”

BJ’s expression is one she’s never seen before. She pulls her hand away from his reflexively, rubs her suddenly sweating palm against the knee of her nightgown. “I understand if you don’t approve. Or if you’re afraid. Or-or disgusted, even. I-I just want to know what you’re honestly feeling, right now. If you--well, I can’t stop loving him any more than I could stop loving you, so I won’t promise that. But it--it doesn’t have to cause any problems. Oh, BJ. Please say something. You’re making me so nervous.”

“You--.” BJ pauses, shakes his head, tries again. “You’re telling me that you and I are in love with the same man.” He buries his face in his hands. It takes a moment for Peg to realize that the choked, strangled sound he makes is laughter, not tears. 

“And you and I are in love with the same woman,” Hawkeye pipes up, with a grin that is far more genuine. Peg can see all his teeth. It makes her grin right back. “Beej! We’ve outdone ourselves with this. The insanity followed us home, and this is the ultimate proof.”

“The Hawkeye Effect,” Peg informs him, primly. “It’s really all your fault.”

“The wh--nevermind. Me? It’s _my_ fault? Peg, in case you haven’t noticed, you’re just as much a part of this as I am. In fact, I think that might be the whole point.”

“BJ is at fault, too, then. He’s the third guilty party, being so lovable.”

BJ’s laugh hitches, catching on a snort. “Oh, God, what did I do in a past life to deserve this?”

“You already know the answer to that,” Peg reminds him. None of this would have happened at all if not for BJ’s actions, a thousand years and a world away. 

“I feel like my brain is going to explode,” Hawkeye complains.

“Who’ll notice the difference?” BJ retorts immediately. 

“Boys, honestly. Stop with the jokes and someone kiss someone else, already, before I die.”

Hawkeye doesn’t have to be told twice. He surges forward, grips BJ’s pajama shirt lapels in two white-knuckled fists and presses his lips hard against BJ’s own. Peg almost looks away, it’s so fierce and desperate. But, well. Madeline _did_ tell her to take something for herself, for once. So, she keeps looking.

BJ’s hand finds the back of Hawkeye’s head. He cradles the other man’s skull as if it is delicate and precious. Their frantic kiss immediately softens, Hawkeye reminded that time is no longer their enemy, and it doesn’t matter if they are caught. When BJ pulls back from the kiss, his eyes are suspiciously wet. Hawkeye hiccups on a breath, near sobs again. 

“Fuck,” he curses, grinding the heels of his palms into his eyes. “If anyone has any suggestions about regaining control of my damn emotions, I’d appreciate it. At this rate, my cheeks are going to fall victim to maceration.”

Peg throws a confused look at BJ. 

“Tissues coming apart due to soaking them in water,” he explains. “I know, it always confuses _me_ when he sounds like a doctor, too.”

Hawkeye flicks the other man’s ear, too busy sniffling to respond with a return gibe. Peg pulls him into a side hug. Hawkeye turns his head and, without warning, kisses her, too. Peg tenses in surprise for just a moment--his mouth is nothing like BJ’s, and her mind protests--but slowly she surrenders to it. Hawkeye’s arms embrace her, holding her steady. His tongue parts her lips and finds its way into her mouth and _oh_ , _wow_ , Hawkeye Pierce knows how to kiss. Suddenly, she understands more than she ever has before why so many nurses--and her own husband, come to think of it--fell under his sway. She moans and, when he goes to leave her, finds herself trying to follow the path of his lips with her own. 

“Uhm,” she says, intelligently, once they’ve parted. 

BJ laughs.

“ _Uhm_ ,” Peg repeats. 

“Hey, careful,” BJ says, still laughing. “I’m going to get jealous.”

“Now, now, Beej. Don’t get ruffled. She’s just not used to me, yet.”

Peg does not think it is _possible_ to ‘get used’ to Benjamin Hawkeye Pierce in any capacity. She still looks forward to trying. She resists the urge to touch her tingling lips with her fingertips and offers her husband a warm, dopey grin.

“C’mere, tiger,” she says, crooking a finger at him. Everything about BJ is good and familiar and right. His kiss doesn’t send electric fireworks up and down her spine, perhaps, but it does make her toes curl and her heart pound. She loves him so much, just as she’s always loved him, just as much as she always will. They’re two pieces of the same puzzle. Family, security, the promise of a lifetime together, all in one kiss. When they break apart, she relaxes against his chest, breathing a sigh of contentment. For the first time in days, she doesn’t feel a pressing need to plan and organize every facet of their lives. She can just exist. She can just be. 

“Oh,” Hawkeye breathes, as if seeing something he’s never seen before. “Now _I’m_ jealous.” And he really sounds it. The longing in his voice strikes right to Peg’s heart, plucking her heartstrings with all the grace of a true aficionado. 

“That,” BJ explains to Hawkeye gently, “That takes a lot of time to build, that’s all.”

Peg offers Hawkeye a smile. “And a _lot_ of marriage counseling, don’t let him fool you. We’ll get there, too.”

“Commitment isn’t a strength of mine,” Hawkeye says, but Peg knows it for a lie. It doesn’t matter where Hawkeye may go, in the future. He’s welcome to let his heart and body roam a bit, if he wants to. He’ll always come home.

She forces herself to shrug casually anyway. “That’s all right. We’re happy with ‘just for now.’ Aren’t we, BJ?”

BJ grins over her head at Hawkeye. “Yeah. Right now is as good a now as any. Just promise you’ll respect us in the morning.”

Hawkeye’s braying laugh makes Peg’s heart soar. She doesn’t know how she will possibly explain this. Not to Erin, not to Madeline, not to the whole of the outside world. But all of that can wait. BJ is right. Now is a good now. They shouldn’t waste it.

She reaches out to both her men. “Thank God for Chicago,” she says.

“Hear, hear.”

\--

If she were truly the writer of her own story--of _their_ story--it might end there. Narratively, it’s tidy enough. Assuming, of course, that the relationship were the point. Which, in fact, it is not. It would be comforting, perhaps, to close it on that note. To fade to black on a scene of a love a long time in the making. To assume that romance obtained makes for an immediate happy ending is the folly of those who read without analysis.

Peg knows how to read between the lines, and she knows that more often than not, the love story is just a subplot at best.

The point is, what she and her boys build between themselves is the beginning, not the end (though there are certainly times when she likes to imagine all that comes afterward as tied up in a neat little bow, obscured from sight by the magic words “and they lived happily ever after.”) Instead, she acknowledges that Chicago was only the prologue to the newest installment of the on-going series that is her life. And the book opens, no doubt, with the first line of Kipling’s “The Prodigal Son,” the same words that had run rampant across Peg’s thoughts the moment that the stranger on the library steps had gripped her hand in his own:

_Here come I to my own again,_

_Fed, forgiven and known again,_

_Claimed by bone of my bone again_

_And cheered by flesh of my flesh._


End file.
